BULLHEAD CITY – The brutal stabbing deaths of a Bullhead City couple were detailed during an April 11 sentencing hearing for the troubled defendant. Mohave County Superior Court Judge Derek Carlisle ordered that Aaron Bryant, 31, shall serve a natural life term followed by a life prison sentence for the gruesome double homicide.
Bryant previously pleaded guilty to the first-degree murders of Tommy and Annette Hinton, who employed him at their pizza business in California years ago before providing Good Samaritan lodging for him after they retired in Bullhead City in the 3700 block of Rawhide Drive.
Mr. Hinton, 62 and his wife, 59, both died of multiple stab wounds sustained in the June 16, 2023, assault in their backyard. Their neighbor Matthew Hughes said he heard screaming before he stood on some logs to peer over the fence to witness Bryant’s arm moving back and forth as he stabbed Annette in the vicinity of a barbeque.
Hughes testified he didn’t realize Bryant was slashing the woman with a knife until he shouted for him to stop and asked what was going on.
“The defendant turned around and said ‘oh, you’re still alive,” Hughes said Bryant exclaimed. Hughes explained that he thought Bryant was advancing toward him with the knife before he saw Tommy at the base and on the other side of the wall below from his vantage point.
Hughes said Bryant repeatedly slashed and stabbed the already badly wounded Hinton as he was positioned on his hands and knees on the ground in the yard. Hughes testified he retrieved a firearm from within his residence before returning to the yard and shooting Bryant in the knee, deliberately wounding without killing him.
The 911 call his daughter made to police was played during the sentencing hearing. She told police dispatch that her armed father was confronting the assailant.
“My dad’s out there with a gun right now,” the teenager shrieked into the emergency phone communication. “He just shot him.”
“He (Bryant) staggered back and fell to the ground,” Hughes told the court, indicating that the defendant was still clutching the knife.
Bullhead City Police detective Angel Gomez testified Annette was still alive but badly wounded when he arrived on scene and that she was fully aware her husband was dying or dead, and that she too, was in bad shape.
“Stay with me. Continue talking to me,” Gomez instructed Annette, urging her to fight for life, while informing fellow officers her condition was precarious. “She’s fading on me guys.”
Gomez said Annette indicated that Bryant was trying to set some oxygen tanks on fire in the yard when Tommy challenged and tried to stop him before the defendant retrieved a knife from the kitchen and stabbed her husband, and then her, when she interceded.
Defense attorney Paul Amann used letters from family members, supplemented by argument, that Bryant suffered from schizophrenia, exacerbated by his decision to quit taking prescribed medicine to treat the condition. A letter from his mother indicated that she expressed concern about her son not taking his meds when he was still residing in California, but that Fortuna police said they could do nothing because he broke no law.
Amann said Bryant was prone to auditory hallucinations when off his meds, perceiving instructions and directives from Satan and others.
Hinton family members spoke of their loss and grief.
“Nothing has been okay since he (Bryant) took my parents from me,” one daughter said. “My whole world has come crashing down on me.”
The Bullhead City police department presented Hughes with a Citizens Medal of Valor for his courage and bravery in defense of the Hintons.
Dave Hawkins