The 2022 shootings left three men dead across six months before a plea deal ended the capital case.
LAS VEGAS, Nev. — Three men killed in separate Las Vegas shootings in 2022 were named again in court when Alonzo Brown, now 22, was sentenced to 56 years to life after pleading guilty to first-degree murder charges.
The hearing closed a case built around the deaths of Tevin Alhashemi, 26, Paul Viana, 62, and Josue Chaparro-Montalvo, 36. Prosecutors said Brown was 18 when the killings started and that two of the men were strangers attacked in public. The sentence means Brown will remain in prison for decades before he can seek parole.
Alhashemi was the first man killed. The shooting happened Jan. 18, 2022, outside an east Las Vegas apartment complex. Prosecutors said Brown and Alhashemi knew each other and had argued about a stolen firearm. That detail set the first case apart from the two that followed. It gave investigators a possible personal link at the start, but the case did not quickly lead to an arrest. As weeks passed, the city moved on without knowing that prosecutors would later say the same teenager was connected to two more fatal shootings. The first death became the opening point in a wider timeline only after later evidence pulled the cases together.
Viana’s killing changed the nature of the investigation. He was shot May 4, 2022, while waiting at a bus stop. Prosecutors said he did not know Brown and had no known dispute with him. The public setting became one of the most disturbing facts in the case. Clark County Chief Deputy District Attorney Marc DiGiacomo said Brown followed Viana before the shooting. In court, DiGiacomo said Brown “literally stalks the victim as the victim was waiting for a bus” and then walked up to kill him. The killing of a 62-year-old man at a transit stop pushed police toward the possibility of a random attack.
Chaparro-Montalvo was killed the next month after leaving a convenience store. He was walking home when he was shot, according to court reporting. Witnesses helped police by describing the person they saw, and that account became important after Brown was involved in a separate hit-and-run crash. Officers reviewed police video tied to that crash and noticed clothing that appeared similar to what witnesses had described in the June killing. That discovery helped investigators focus on Brown. It also gave police a new way to look back at the earlier cases, including the bus stop shooting and the January apartment complex killing.
The three victims did not fit one simple profile. They ranged in age from 26 to 62. One knew Brown, while two were described as strangers. They were killed in different public or semi-public places along the east side of Las Vegas, including near Tropicana Avenue. Prosecutors said that pattern mattered because it showed the killings were not part of one argument or one isolated fight. Police officials said in 2022 that surveillance video appeared to show a suspect stalking a victim. At the time, investigators said they had not found an apparent motive for at least one of the stranger killings.
Brown’s own words became part of the record before he pleaded guilty. After his arrest in 2022, he denied that he was the killer and rejected the label prosecutors later used in court. “A normal, sane 18-year-old kid is not going to go ahead and wake up and go on a killing spree,” he said in a jail interview. He also said, “I’m just a 19-year-old young man trying to figure out life.” Those statements stood in contrast to the prosecution’s later description. DiGiacomo told the sentencing court that Brown had decided to become a serial killer, framing the case as a set of chosen attacks rather than confusion or impulse.
The path to sentencing took years. Brown was arrested in 2022, and the case moved through competency proceedings before he entered a plea late last year. Prosecutors had earlier planned to seek the death penalty if the case went to trial and ended in conviction. The plea agreement changed that. It removed death and life without parole from the possible outcomes while requiring Brown to admit guilt to three first-degree murder counts. Clark County District Court Judge Michelle Leavitt then imposed 56 years to life on April 15, giving the victims’ families a final judgment in the trial court.
The courtroom proceeding placed the victims’ families at the center of the final public step. They had lived with a case that stretched from the first killing in January 2022 to the sentence in April 2026. Brown spoke before the sentence and offered condolences. “First, I’d like to express my condolences to the family,” he said. “It’s not an easy time for my family and for the trials and tribulations you’re all going through, so I can’t imagine what it’s like for y’all.” The statement came after his guilty plea and before the judge confirmed the long prison term.
Brown received credit for time served, but that credit does not bring his parole eligibility close. Officials said he will not be eligible until 2078. The date means he would be in his 70s if he is alive when he first becomes eligible to ask for release. The sentence does not erase the deaths of Alhashemi, Viana and Chaparro-Montalvo, but it fixes Brown’s punishment after years of investigation and court proceedings.
With the sentence entered, the case now moves from the trial court record to the prison system. Brown remains in custody under a life sentence with a minimum term of 56 years, and the next major date in the case is his parole eligibility in 2078.
Author note: Last updated May 8, 2026.