'Attack on the judiciary': Man gets hefty sentence for beating judge in courtroom

A man who leaped over a bench and beat a 62-year-old Las Vegas judge during a court appearance has been sentenced to decades in prison, according to a report.

Deobra Redden, 31, pleaded guilty but mentally ill to attempted murder in September stemming from the Jan. 3 attack on Las Vegas District Court Judge Mary Kay Holthus.

The attack happened as Holthus sentenced him to prison in a separate case. Several others in court fought with Redden in the courtroom and threw him to the ground.

On Tuesday, prosecutors asked District Court Judge Susan Johnson to sentence him to significant prison time, and Redden’s attorneys asked that he serve a concurrent prison sentence to the one Holthus laid down. The judge sentenced him to serve 26 to 65 years, calling the beating an "attack on the judiciary," 8NewsNow reported.

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"It was not just retaliation or an attack on Judge Holthus,” Johnson said. “It was also an attack on the judiciary.” Johnson noted that doctors who evaluated Redden found he knew "right and wrong."

Before he was sentenced, Redden insisted he was "not a bad person" and "not an evil guy."

"I’m not making excuses for my actions, but I’m saying I’m not a bad person and I know that I did not intend to kill Mary Kay Holthus, I know I cared about her wellbeing," he said.

Holthus took a different view of the attack, saying in a statement read by prosecutors: “He made a conscious decision to kill me and made every effort to succeed. If he had his way, he’d be facing a sentence of life without the possibility of parole for murder."