LAS VEGAS (KLAS) — Videos the 8 News Now Investigators obtained show a serial kidnapping suspect appearing in a Las Vegas courtroom before he was released for credit for time served. He later tortured a woman and killed two men.
Benjamin Foster, 36, was the center of a manhunt in Oregon for several days before he was found with a self-inflicted gunshot wound Tuesday.
Las Vegas Metro police arrested Foster in October 2019, records showed. A woman called police, saying Foster had held her against her will in an apartment for two weeks.
Foster strangled the woman and shaved her head, police said. He tied her up with zip ties and duct tape, officers said. During the two-week period, Foster repeatedly said cameras were watching her, documents said. The woman was able to escape when she convinced Foster to take her to a grocery store.
Foster’s first step of the criminal process in Las Vegas, his probable cause hearing, lasted just about a minute.
“Do you understand the charges against you?” the judge asked Foster.
“I believe so, yes,” he said.
In September 2021, Foster took a plea deal on charges of battery with substantial bodily harm and battery constituting domestic violence. Judge Tierra Jones sentenced him to a term of 12-to-30 months in the Nevada Department of Corrections with a credit of 729 days served.
Again, Foster did not say much during the court hearing. When a judge asked him if he understood the Alford plea he was taking, Foster responded, “Yes, your honor.”
Foster’s plea meant he did not admit guilt but understood prosecutors had enough evidence to sway a jury to convict him.
“Is there anything you want to say? I’m going to give you the sentence that you guys agreed to,” Jones told Foster during his sentencing hearing.
“No,” he said.
Because of the two years Foster awaiting trial from jail, the Department of Corrections released Foster on the day he was admitted, a spokesman said.
Investigators in Oregon believed Foster used dating apps to lure women into helping him escape or to find other victims. Grants Pass police had said Foster did not have much to lose if he was caught.
Foster’s most-recent victim remained in critical condition and is in a coma in Oregon.