LAS VEGAS — A prosecutor said Monday he may ask a grand jury to indict a Las Vegas firefighter and the homeless man he's accused of hiring for the fatal hammer bludgeoning of the firefighter's estranged cocktail waitress wife.
With media and two co-workers of the slain woman in the courtroom, firefighter George Miguel Tiaffay spoke only during his brief arraignment to correct how the judge pronounced his name.
Neither Tiaffay nor co-defendant Noel Scott Stevens was asked to enter a plea. That would come when and if a grand jury hands up an indictment or Las Vegas Justice of the Peace Deborah Lippis determines there is enough evidence for trial in state court.
Police allege that Tiaffay paid Stevens $600 and provided the key to Shauna Tiaffay's apartment weeks before the 46-year-old mother of an 8-year-old daughter was killed as she returned home from a midnight shift at the Palms Casino Hotel. George Tiaffay was at work at the time as a Las Vegas city firefighter.
George Tiaffay had their daughter with him when he arrived at Shauna Tiaffay's apartment at a little after 9 a.m. Sept. 29, discovered the body and summoned police.
Medics told investigators they couldn't tell if Shauna Tiaffay had been shot or bludgeoned, and the mangled fingers on her right hand bore defensive wounds.
The alleged murder conspiracy unraveled after Stevens, who went by the name "Greyhound," allegedly bragged about the slaying to someone who contacted police. Police said Stevens later told another witness that he had been promised $20,000 for the killing.
"To think something so cruel was done to her," Palms Casino Hotel co-worker Lacey Green said outside the courtroom on Monday. "It's hard to believe."
Green called Shauna Tiaffay's daughter "Shauna's whole world and life."
The judge scheduled a Jan. 24 evidentiary hearing for George Tiaffay, 40, and Stevens, 37, on multiple felony charges including murder, conspiracy, burglary and robbery that could qualify for the death penalty. A decision whether to seek capital punishment would come when and if the case reaches state court.
Tiaffay's lawyers, Robert Langford and Maggie McLetchie, and two public defenders appointed for Stevens, Curtis Brown and Dan Silverstein, didn't object to the long preliminary hearing date. The defense teams may seek the release of the two men on bond in coming weeks.
Chief Deputy Clark County District Attorney Marc DiGiacomo told the judge he may seek an indictment that would make the preliminary hearing moot. Prosecutors will decide later whether to seek the death penalty.
George Tiaffay has been a city firefighter for 10 years. He has been suspended without pay, city spokesman David Riggleman said Monday.