Brandon Lee Toseland
A man accused of kidnapping his girlfriend and killing her preschool-aged son appeared in Las Vegas Justice Court today, two days after the woman’s other child presented a note written by the woman to school officials stating she was being held against her will.
Brandon Lee Toseland, 35, was arrested Tuesday on counts of open murder and kidnapping, jail records show.
He was denied bail at today’s initial hearing and is due back in court Monday, when the kidnapping case and murder case will be consolidated, Pro Tempore Judge Holly Stoberski ruled.
Public Defender Scott Coffee was appointed by Stoberski to represent Toseland.
Coffee said he had not yet spoken with Toseland, but believes his client’s apparent “spectrum of mental health concerns” may play into the case.
“That’s the first thing we’re going to look into to make sure he can move forward,” Coffee said.
Metro Police discovered the body of Mason Dominguez, 4, shortly after Toseland’s arrest Tuesday.
The body was inside a trash bag in a freezer under a “false cardboard bottom and under multiple items of food,” according to Toseland’s arrest report.
Police received a call just after 8:30 a.m. Tuesday from Clark County School District Police stating a student had multiple notes from their mother — whose name is redacted in the report — advising they were being held against their will and needed help, police said.
Officers were dispatched to the school and a residence in the 4300 block of Saddle Brook Park Drive in Las Vegas, where officers observed a man later identified as Toseland and a woman drive away in a white Nissan sedan, according to the arrest report.
Police later stopped the car and observed handcuffs attached to the car where the woman was seated, the report said.
The woman told detectives her son, Dominguez, became sick on Dec. 11 and that Toseland would not let her care for the boy, the report said.
Toseland then took Dominguez into the master bedroom and barricaded the door to prevent her from entering, according to the arrest report.
For several days, Toseland told the woman he could not show her Dominguez’s body because “his freedom would be taken away,” according to the arrest report. She was eventually given access back into the master bedroom but was not allowed in the garage and also had her cell phone taken by Toseland, police said.
The woman at one point demanded Toseland explain where her son was, to which he responded that he found Dominguez dead, covered in his own vomit, the report said.
Toseland again told the woman she could not see Dominguez’s body on grounds “he would lose his freedom,” police said.
When police searched Toseland, both his and the woman’s cell phones were found on his person, according to the arrest report.
Once taken into custody, Toseland refused to speak with detectives, police said.
After he was advised that a search warrant was served at his residence, Toseland became “visibly nervous” and began to shake, police said.