Man who shot, killed Las Vegas dentist in 1980 gets life without parole

It was 1980 and Mary Catherine Monahan was 14 when she, her father and her father’s wife met a man at Caesars Palace who was interested in buying a van her dad was selling.

The man claimed to work in security and displayed a badge, she said. He arranged to meet again with her father, a Las Vegas dentist named George Monahan, the next morning.

The day after the meeting at the casino, Samuel Howard, the prospective van buyer, fatally shot George Monahan.

Howard was sentenced to death in 1983, but the Nevada Supreme Court deemed him ineligible for capital punishment in 2021 after he spent decades on death row. So at 60, Monahan’s daughter appeared in court Tuesday to speak about her father and push for Howard, who is now 77, to spend the rest of his days behind bars.

At the end of the hourslong resentencing hearing, District Judge Jacqueline Bluth granted her request, ordering a life without the possibility of parole sentence for Howard.

Bluth noted the rarety of sentencing a defendant for a crime committed 45 years ago.

“I think this is probably the most difficult sentencing that I’ve ever done for so many reasons,” she said.

‘Last sliver of justice’

Howard had experienced extreme trauma, Bluth said, and seemed to have “turned his life around” in the four decades since the killing.

But, she said, “I cannot take away the last sliver of justice that the Monahan family has.”

Mary Catherine Monahan told the judge about the things her father had missed.

He did not see her and her brother grow up, graduate from high school or college, get married and have their own children, she said.

“He killed him for nothing,” said the victim’s daughter. “He didn’t take the van and he got little, if any, cash from his wallet. My dad was only 39 years old.”

The Las Vegas Review-Journal previously reported that Howard robbed Monahan of $2.

Chief Deputy District Attorney Nicholas Portz told the judge that Howard had a history of violent crime, including multiple armed robberies. Like Monahan’s daughter, he asked for a sentence of life without parole, saying victims in the case deserved a sense of finality.

Defense mitigation arguments

Lawyers for Howard advocated for a sentence of life with the possibility of parole and talked about mitigating circumstances in his life.

“Mr. Howard is plainly a different person now than he was in 1983,” said attorney Jonah Horwitz.

Howard’s father murdered his mother and a baby sister in front of him when Howard was 3, according to Horwitz.

He was later sent to a reform school where children were raped and used as labor, said the lawyer, and served in Vietnam.

According to court documents, Howard was a minesweeper in the Marines, received commendations and was honorably discharged. But his experience in the war also “compounded the PTSD that he already had as a result of his childhood experiences,” his attorneys argued.

Horwitz said Howard still suffers from nightmares about Vietnam. He is now “riddled with health problems,” his attorneys said, but is deeply religious and has a strong support network.

Prosecutors said in a sentencing memorandum that Howard acted predatorily and with intent.

“Dr. Monahan offered Defendant courtesy and cooperation; Defendant repaid him with deceit and death,” they wrote.

Howard did not speak during the resentencing, but appeared via Zoom, wearing a blue prison uniform.

‘It’s like yesterday’

To the victim’s family, the slaying still feels fresh.

“It may have been over 40 years, but to us, it’s like yesterday,” said the victim’s sister, Mary George. “We live his loss every day, and I hope his murderer spends the rest of his life in prison.”

Mary Lou Walton, the victim’s wife, worked with her husband as a dental hygienist and told the judge about the day Monahan was killed.

“I kissed him goodbye, not realizing it would be the last time,” she said. Monahan arrived at his office before her and when she arrived, she said, “Everybody was like: ‘Where’s George?’”

His 7 a.m. patient was still waiting, she said, and no one knew where he was.

“I walked out to the side parking lot to see if the van was there, and it was not,” she said. “So I knew immediately there was something wrong.”

Later that day, police found the van behind a bar on Boulder Highway. Monahan was inside, face down. He had a gunshot wound to the back of his head.

“I can’t even tell you what that was like,” said Walton. “I was 30 years old. I was totally out of my element. I didn’t know what to do, what to say.”

She said her family now lives out their own “life sentence of grief and sadness with no parole.” She would be “terrified” if Howard was ever released, she told the judge.

After the hearing was over, she and other family members of the victim said they were glad about Bluth’s decision.

“It’s been 45 years of waiting for justice and tonight, we finally have justice for my dad,” said Mary Catherine Monahan.

Contact Noble Brigham at nbrigham@reviewjournal.com. Follow @BrighamNoble on X.