Police use debit card to link suspect to Las Vegas homicide

Anthony Groce walked into a convenience store in the north valley early one August morning and soon came out with a fountain drink. About an hour and a half later, police found him shot to death in a dirt lot nearby.

James Smith, a man who accompanied Groce to the store, was arrested on an open murder charge in connection with the shooting on Oct. 9, after police used his debit card to link him to the crime, according to a recently released arrest report.

Groce, 37, and Smith, 36, walked to the 7-Eleven at 835 N. Martin Luther King Blvd. around 2 a.m. Aug. 24, according to the arrest report. Police said surveillance footage from the 7-Eleven showed that Groce entered the shop around 2:07 a.m. while Smith stayed outside, “rubbing his hands together and making movements with his hands and arms, almost as if he was dancing.”

According to the Metropolitan Police Department report, Groce came back out with a fountain drink around 2:20 a.m. and Smith went in five minutes later.

“While the male talked to the store clerk he continued the same arm and hand movements/dancing movements he had done outside the store,” the report said. “While the male was in the store, he appeared to purposefully avoid using his left hand,” opening doors and getting his wallet with his right hand.

Smith paid for his transaction with a debit card, the report said.

He met Groce outside just before 2:30 a.m. and the two stayed there for a few minutes before walking south on Martin Luther King Boulevard together and crossing to head east, the report said.

Metro’s ShotSpotter system detected 13 gunshots from 840 Bonanza Road, about three-quarters of a mile southeast of the 7-Eleven. Officers responded and found Groce in a dirt lot on the southwest corner of H Street and McWilliams Avenue with his pants pulled down just above the knee “and the underwear appeared to be cut,” the report said.

He was pronounced dead at the scene, with “multiple gunshot wounds to the torso and lower extremities,” the report said. The Clark County coroner’s office ruled his death a homicide.

Tracking a suspect

Police identified Smith by the debit card he used for the transaction at 7-Eleven that night. The report noted that he has “an extensive criminal history out of California, Oklahoma, Kansas, West Virginia and Missouri,” though his prior arrests were redacted. He was described as “a multi-convicted felon.”

He had two previous run-ins with police in Las Vegas, and in both it was noted that his left hand shook and he avoided using it, which was consistent with the surveillance footage from the 7-Eleven on Aug. 24, the report said.

Officers used DMV records to find Smith’s address, where they watched him get into his car on Oct. 9 and followed him to a plasma center where he was taken into custody around 10 a.m. Officers found a revolver in a fanny pack around his waist, the report said.

They returned to the house, where they found Smith’s wife. She told them that she had been in the hospital from Aug. 12 to Sept. 23 with her baby, who was born two months prematurely, the report said. She pointed officers to two other guns they had in the home.

When police interviewed Smith, he said that he carries a gun “so ‘they’ don’t hurt him” but acknowledged that he’s prohibited from owning firearms and that it was wrong for him to have a gun, the report said.

Smith admitted that he was with Groce in the early hours of Aug. 24 and said Groce wanted to find drugs, but he denied being in the area of H Street and McWilliams Avenue at any point.

“Smith seemed visibly shaken and distraught when detectives specifically questioned him about his involvement in the murder” and requested an attorney, the report said.

Smith was arrested and is charged with open murder with a deadly weapon. He is being held in the Clark County Detention Center on $100,000 bail, jail records show. He is expected in court on Nov. 9.

Kind-hearted brother

According to the arrest report, Groce’s family told police “that Anthony was involved in a fight at the gas station with a male. It was believed that the male lost the fight and ultimately found Anthony later on and shot him.”

But Groce’s sister, Kolleen Banks, disputed that, saying the family knew nothing about what happened and calling the arrest report “false information.”

She said her brother was kind-hearted and always cracking jokes, and she wasn’t sure why anyone would have wanted to hurt him.

“He would give his last even when he may not have had much,” she said. “He was just so cool.”

Groce was a star athlete for much of his life, playing basketball and football in school, Banks said.

“He was so talented on the field and the court,” Banks said. “Not only was he an all-star on the field in the court, he was always an all-star with the women as long as they were older than him. He was a smooth operator.”

His mother, Kathleen Harris, said she knows her son will be missed by all who knew him.

“He would always attempt to be smooth even when things weren’t going his way,” Harris said. “Believe it or not, he remembered the lessons taught to him by his parents about faith, love and family. At the end of the day, that’s my son.”

Contact Alexis Ford at aford@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0335. Follow @alexisdford on Twitter.