North Las Vegas stepfather charged with sex assault, kidnapping
A man charged with child abuse after North Las Vegas police said he impregnated his 17-year-old stepdaughter then left her for months with her 3-year-old sister, who died in his absence, now faces additional counts of sexual assault and kidnapping.
Jondrew Lachaux, 39, now faces 20 felony charges after an amended complaint filed in North Las Vegas Justice Court on Thursday. That includes 17 counts of child abuse, and one count each of sexual assault, kidnapping and concealing evidence.
He was arrested April 6 in connection with a child abuse probe that turned up the toddler’s body and the teen’s malnourished infant. Police said the teen mom and her dead sister are two of seven children in Lachaux and 38-year-old Kellie Phillips’ family. Phillips was arrested April 7.
The 17-year-old girl is Phillips’ oldest child, police said, and her youngest is 1. Lachaux is the biological father of the six other children.
Clark County District Attorney Steven Wolfson dropped a child abuse charge against the teen Monday. She was released from the Clark County Juvenile Detention Center into the custody of Child Protective Services. Her identity has not been made public. The teen’s baby and her five younger siblings also are with Protective Services.
The teen was pregnant when Lachaux and Phillips abandoned her around August, headed for Oakland, Calif., police said. But Phillips didn’t know her daughter was pregnant. The girl gave birth alone at their home in the 6600 block of Wood Thrush Place, near the north 215 Beltway between Decatur Boulevard and Aliante Parkway.
She didn’t have any medical attention. Without enough food, the teen, her infant and the toddler got malnourished, police said. The toddler, who had breathing problems, eventually died.
After her sister died, police said, she called Lachaux and he told her to hide her sister’s body in a box. Lachaux came home in late March and made the teen help him move the body into the back seat of a broken down car in the family garage where they covered it.
Lachaux then gave his stepdaughter some baby formula and put her and the baby on the streets, police said. He didn’t want his wife to find out he’d fathered the child. He put the teen and baby up for one night at a Motel 6, police said. Otherwise the mother and daughter spent as much time as possible in public areas along the Strip and at McCarran International Airport.
The baby got sick at the airport April 1, police said, and staff there called 911. The baby was taken to Sunrise Hospital Medical Center in critical condition, and police started investigating.
Lachaux is scheduled for another North Las Vegas court appearance April 20 at 8:30 a.m. to have counsel assigned.
The preliminary hearing for Phillips and Lachaux is scheduled for May 21 at 9 a.m. in the North Las Vegas Justice Court.
Contact reporter Colton Lochhead at clochhead@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-4638. Find him on Twitter: @ColtonLochhead.
