Charges added in Vegas police officer protest wounding case

Edgar Samaniego, right, charged in shooting of a Las Vegas police officer, listens to his defense attorney Scott Coffee at the Regional Justice Center in Las Vegas. Prosecutors have filed four more felony charges against Samaniego, accused of attempted murder in a shooting during a Las Vegas Strip protest that left a police officer paralyzed. (Bizuayehu Tesfaye/Las Vegas Review-Journal via AP, File)

Edgar Samaniego, right, charged in shooting of a Las Vegas police officer, listens to his defense attorney Scott Coffee at the Regional Justice Center in Las Vegas. Prosecutors have filed four more felony charges against Samaniego, accused of attempted murder in a shooting during a Las Vegas Strip protest that left a police officer paralyzed. (Bizuayehu Tesfaye/Las Vegas Review-Journal via AP, File)

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LAS VEGAS — Prosecutors in Las Vegas have filed four more felony charges Thursday against a 20-year-old man accused of attempted murder in a shooting during a Las Vegas Strip protest that left a police officer wounded and paralyzed.

Edgar Samaniego's newly hired attorney, John Turco, didn't immediately respond to messages after a preliminary hearing of evidence was postponed to Aug. 27.

Prosecutor Giancarlo Pesci said additional assault with a weapon and discharge of a firearm charges were added after investigators found evidence that Samaniego fired three shots, not two, late June 1 near the Circus Circus resort.

The protest was one of hundreds nationally following the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis.

A judge who reviewed evidence at an earlier court hearing said police video showed Samaniego "walking by, taking out a gun and firing."

Samaniego remains jailed on $1 million bail. He pleaded guilty June 22 in a separate misdemeanor drug case and was sentenced to 45 days in jail.

The police officer, Shay Mikalonis, 29, was wounded in the head. He has been transferred to an out-of-state spinal injury rehabilitation center.

In a statement released by police, Mikalonis' family said he remained paralyzed from the neck down, on a ventilator and unable to speak.

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