Troy Driver following his arrest Friday, March 25, 2022.
Lyon County Sheriff's Office
By Scott Sonner Associated Press
Saturday, September 3, 2022
RENO — A justice of the peace has canceled this month’s preliminary hearing for a man accused of kidnapping and killing a Fernley teenager until a state judge decides if he’s competent to stand trial.
Troy Driver was scheduled to appear in justice court in Fernley Sept. 13-15 for a preliminary hearing to determine whether there’s enough evidence to bound him over to Lyon County District Court on murder, kidnapping and other charges in the fatal shooting of 18-year-old Naomi Irion.
Canal Township Justice Court Judge Lori Matheus vacated the hearing in an order Sept. 1, along with a Sept. 13 hearing on Driver’s public defenders’ motion to dismiss some of the charges.
“The proceedings in this matter shall be suspended until the question of competence is determined,” she wrote.
A date for that hearing hasn’t been set.
Driver faces six charges in addition to first-degree murder, including sexual assault, robbery and destroying evidence. His lawyers argue he can’t legally be tried in Lyon County for the March killing, which occurred in neighboring Churchill County.
Prosecutors maintain he can be tried in Lyon County on all charges because he kidnapped Irion from a Walmart there before he shot and buried her in the desert “all as one continuous course of conduct.”
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