Lamar Odom planned to enter a no contest plea in his Las Vegas DUI case, a move that would have changed the shape of the case just as a bench trial was set to begin in Las Vegas Justice Court the next day.
He is 46 and was not expected to appear in court to make the plea himself, according to his defense attorney, Kevin Coburn. That detail matters because the filing would have come at a point when the case could have shifted from a contested DUI proceeding into a narrower legal track before testimony started.
Coburn said the plea would not leave Odom with a DUI conviction. If Odom completed the required conditions, the case would be put on pause and the charge would be reduced to reckless driving. Prosecutors did not immediately confirm the terms, and Coburn said the plan was not yet a done deal.
The timing gives the move its weight. Odom was arrested in January on DUI and speeding charges after police said he drove more than 110 mph on Interstate 15 south of Russell Road and failed multiple sobriety tests while smelling of marijuana. The planned plea came the day before the bench trial was scheduled to start, making it the latest turn in a case that had been heading for a court fight.
Odom’s legal history has made the new filing more closely watched than an ordinary traffic case. He played 14 NBA seasons for the Los Angeles Clippers, the Los Angeles Lakers, the Miami Heat and the Dallas Mavericks, was a UNLV basketball recruit in 1997, had a previous DUI arrest in 2013 and nearly died from a drug overdose at a Nye County brothel in 2015. He entered rehab after the January arrest, and Coburn previously said he had successfully completed rehab.
What remains unresolved is the part that determines whether the case actually changes course: the plea had not yet been formally entered, and the terms that would trigger a reduction to reckless driving were not immediately spelled out. For now, the case was poised to move on paper before it moved in court.
