Now, more than 2½ years after Bob Stupak’s death, an attorney for his estate has sent to NASA officials in Houston a tabletop display featuring the four gray chips the size of grains of rice. They’re magnified in a Lucite dome about as big around as a U.S. 50-cent piece set with a small blue and white Nicaraguan flag. Combined, the chips weigh 0.05 grams.

Renee Juhans, NASA inspector general executive officer, confirmed Tuesday that the agency was “taking steps to authenticate” the display it received from attorney Richard Wright. Juhans declined to say what would happen after that.

Wright said he expects that if the chips are authentic, they’ll be returned to the people of the Central American country. If not, he said they should be sent back to him.

“I told them it was either Stupak’s or Nicaragua’s,” said Wright, who said he counseled Stupak when ownership questions were raised more than a decade ago not to try to sell or auction the display.

The tiny rocks can be considered priceless or worthless, said Joe Gutheinz, a retired NASA investigator and moon rock hunter who has spent decades on a quest to find 160 missing moon rock samples around the world.

“In a sense, they’re worthless because you can’t sell them,” Gutheinz said by telephone this week from his law office in Friendswood, Texas. “But for people who love space, you can’t put a price on it.”

They’re part of a limited supply of about 842 pounds of rock collected by U.S. astronauts in six missions between Apollo 11 in 1969 and Apollo 17 in 1972. The Soviet Union collected about 300 grams of rock, or about two-thirds of a pound, during unmanned probes to the moon.

Gutheinz said the U.S. distributed 270 moon rock samples in the 1970s as a goodwill gesture to countries around the world. States received 100 samples and territories received six. The United Nations received a sample from the Apollo 11 mission.

NASA has conceded it lost track of some of the 26,000 samples of moon rock and other space material loaned to researchers and museums. The agency inspector general said last December that more than 500 pieces were reported missing since 1970.

The tiny chips that made their way to Stupak by 1987 apparently were a gift to Nicaragua.

Stupak was a wheeler, dealer and gambler of the first order. He won a $1 million wager on Super Bowl XXIII and a World Series of Poker championship bracelet, both in 1989; nearly died in a motorcycle crash in 1995; and lost a bid in 2006 to become lieutenant governor of Nevada.

For a time, Wright said, the lunar stones were displayed at the Moon Rock Cafe at Bob Stupak’s Vegas World casino, which featured a rocket ship logo and big sign declaring “Sky’s the Limit.” The display went into storage after Stupak replaced the place with the tallest structure on the Las Vegas Strip, the 1,149-foot Stratosphere tower resembling the iconic Space Needle in Seattle.

Stupak bought the rocks for $10,000 and 200,000 shares in his casino from Arizona preacher and businessman Harry Coates, according to documents provided by Wright and the recollections of Coates’ widow, Silvina Coates.

Harry Coates, a Baptist minister and missionary, met his wife in 1985 during a mission to Costa Rica. He died in July 2005 in Arizona at age 85.

Silvina Coates, of Casa Grande, Ariz., recalled Tuesday that her husband had lots of side business deals, including one with a man in Costa Rica for the moon rock display. She couldn’t remember what the trade involved.

Wright has a copy of Stupak’s $10,000 check to Harry Coates’ business, Midway Development Inc., along with an affidavit describing how Coates acquired the display from a man named Bob Stone of Golfito, Costa Rica.

The display had been picked from a pile of looted items by an unnamed Costa Rican mercenary fighting with Nicaraguan soldiers when a Somoza compound dubbed “El Retire” was sacked “at the time of the revolution in Nicaragua,” according to the affidavit. It said the mercenary later switched sides to fight for the Contras, before returning to Costa Rica in 1979.

“Bob bought it in good faith,” Wright said.

Stupak wanted to sell the display a little more than a decade ago. He offered Wright 10 percent of the proceeds if he could help, then upped the offer to 25 percent.

Wright counseled him that he couldn’t auction or sell it, because whether it had been lost or stolen, it wasn’t clear that Stupak had any legal right to own it.

After Stupak died, Wright contacted NASA and the Nicaraguan consulate about returning the display.

Wright obtained a written promise in April from NASA attorney Cedric Campbell that if the rock display is authentic, “NASA will return the rock to the people of Nicaragua.”

A Las Vegas Review-Journal columnist who wrote about Stupak’s moon rocks in March 2001 wrote about them again for a Sunday column. After an interview on Friday, Wright sent the display off to NASA.

Gutheinz, who teaches an online University of Phoenix course and enlists student sleuths to find missing moon rocks, said the sample sounded authentic. He said he expects an ownership fight in Nicaragua.

But that’ll just provide another chapter for one of the many stories Gutheinz tells about moon rock samples. He said his students have helped find 79 displays since 2002.

Governors took them home in Colorado, West Virginia and Missouri, he said. A display given to then-Arkansas Gov. Bill Clinton turned up in archived materials after Clinton became president.

“Here, the attorney did the right thing,” Gutheinz said. “He told NASA, and they’re in the process of turning it over properly. We can only hope that Nicaragua gets its property back.”

“Despite good intentions … a party cannot just come in and state on their own that they wish to be a party to this case,” the judge said. “The court has to follow the law. It’s not for me to decide what action Henderson should take.”

Lawyers for the Lexus Project said they want to appeal.

Kishner declined to issue a formal order postponing euthanasia pending an appeal. But she said there will be time before her order is written, signed and filed.

Henderson city spokesman Keith Paul issued a statement later saying the dog would remain in the city animal shelter until the order is reviewed by attorneys on both sides and signed. He said the process could take several days.

The court proceeding in Las Vegas had its share of drama. The judge declared from the bench that she volunteers at a cat shelter and her family adopts rescue animals. Neither side objected to having Kishner decide the case.

Outside the courthouse, protesters waved signs and staked out their positions on a death sentence for the dog named Onion.

“Don’t Punish the Dog,” read a poster that Annoula Wylderich waved in a cluster of about 12 animal rights advocates. None said they ever met the dog or its owners.

“Let’s Make Dog Tacos,” read a sign held aloft by Brad Keith, an electrician standing alone on the sidewalk. He said he learned about the protest on the TV news.

No one inside or outside the courtroom represented the family that was devastated when the boy’s first birthday celebration ended in tragedy April 27. Family members later told reporters the dog reacted suddenly when the toddler grabbed its fur to pull himself to a standing position.

City officials said Onion bit the boy’s face and head, ripping flesh from bone and holding on for half a minute before family members could pry him away. The boy’s grandmother signed ownership and custody of the dog over to city animal control officials and said she wouldn’t contest quarantine and euthanasia. Family members have said since that they just want the ordeal to end.

The boy’s father, Christopher Shahan, did not immediately respond Friday to a message seeking comment.

Chandan Manansingh and Kathy McCarthy, representing the Lexus Project, said outside court that they never met the family or the dog. They were enlisted by Lexus Project President Robin Mittasch of Oceanside, N.Y., to obtain from Kishner a temporary order postponing the dog’s death until the court had time to hear arguments.

The question they argued Friday was whether a trust document that Mittasch filed in New York gave her the right to take ownership and custody of the dog and send him to an animal sanctuary outside Denver.

“Provocation must be viewed from the dog’s perspective,” Manansingh said. He asked the judge to consider the plight of a lifelong family pet now “locked up, isolated, scared, lonely and confused.”

“Onion has a chance at a second chance,” he said.

Kishner listened for 90 minutes before ruling the trust document didn’t establish ownership. The organization also didn’t follow proper administrative steps with the city before going to state court, she said, and nothing in the record contested the declaration that the dog was vicious.

Assistant Henderson City Attorney Michael Oh underscored the vicious animal finding, saying the dog has been aggressive in recent days toward other animals and a veterinarian who approached it during quarantine at the city shelter.

Sparing the dog’s life “might be something a lot of people in the community might like,” the judge said. “It’s not something the court has a legal right to do.”

Slaughter, 27, remained jailed without bail. She faces a murder charge that could put her in prison for the rest of her life.

Her lawyer, deputy Clark County Public Defender Andrea Luem, said she isn’t contesting Slaughter’s competency for trial. Instead, Slaughter is claiming temporary insanity.

Prosecutor Pam Weckerly declined to comment outside court.

Slaughter was found naked, barefoot and bloody March 11 near her home in northwest Las Vegas shortly before her live-in boyfriend summoned police. They found Slaughter’s daughter, Kyla Franks, dead in a bedroom and a pair of scissors nearby.

A frenzied Slaughter told police who took her to a hospital that the blood on her hands was from the “lamb of God.”

“Did I kill my daughter? Is she dead?” Slaughter later asked homicide detectives.

In a recorded interview, Slaughter told investigators she had been having trouble sleeping since she started taking a caffeinated, over-the-counter weight-loss product four days before the slaying. She said she slept just one hour the night before.

Police said it wasn’t clear if lack of sleep and taking the dietary supplement had any effect on the slaying.

Slaughter told police she kept her daughter home from daycare the day of the slaying because she felt an “evil presence” in the house.

She said the two were sitting on the bed when the girl spoke in “evil words,” laughed “in an evil voice” and clawed and kicked at her, police said in an arrest report. Slaughter told police she picked up the scissors and struck the child several times.

“One of the first things that Danielle told the detectives was that she could not believe she had killed her daughter,” the police report said.

The horrific home slayings were discovered almost 30 hours later, when a 9-year-old boy arrived at school and told administrators that his sister and mother were dead in their house about four blocks away.

“He also reported his father had two holes in his head, was acting strange and there was blood all over the home,” Las Vegas police said in the report.

Police arriving at the boy’s house on Robin Street briefly saw a frightened 4-year-old boy inside before finding the father, Arturo Martinez, 39, barely alive. Martinez was able to shuffle out the front door before collapsing, a neighbor said. He remains hospitalized in critical condition, unable to communicate.

The 4-year-old boy was coaxed from the house and was not physically injured.

“The boys are OK. Thank God, physically OK,” their aunt, Gaudia Martinez, told The Associated Press on Monday. She said she has visited her brother in the hospital’s intensive care, but he hasn’t been able to communicate.

In the home, police also found 38-year-old Ignacia Yadira Martinez and her 10-year-old daughter, Karla Edith Martinez, dead in their beds. Authorities later reported that both had been sexually assaulted.

DNA evidence obtained from the mother and a bloody left thumbprint obtained at the house were matched to Clay, Las Vegas police Lt. Ray Steiber said. Police also found the claw hammer that Steiber described as the murder weapon.

“I’ve been doing this 24 years, and this is the case that you hope you never see,” Steiber told reporters late Friday.

In interviews Saturday and Monday with AP, Steiber characterized the slayings as “savage” and “heinous.”

He said investigators don’t know why Clay allegedly picked the Martinez home. Steiber said the intruder apparently entered through an unlocked front or back door.

But “the physical evidence, including DNA, makes us confident we have the right person and he is the only person involved in these crimes,” Steiber said.

In a recorded interview with police following his arrest, Clay said that in the hours before the attacks he drank alcohol, took the club drug Ecstasy and smoked cigarettes dipped in the chemical drug PCP.

Police said several calls placed between about 2 a.m. and 4 a.m. were made with the phone taken from the 50-year-old woman. Some were to acquaintances of Clay, including a 17-year-old girl and two people who Clay later told detectives would be “the first people he would call if he was in trouble or scared.” Clay denied making the calls.

Steiber said Clay had no “significant” criminal history before his arrest Friday morning at his mother’s home in northeast Las Vegas on a warrant charging him with felony child abuse in a separate case involving a teenage girlfriend.

Police got their crucial break when a DNA sample collected from Clay following his arrest on the child abuse charge matched the evidence from the attempted rape and the attacks at the Martinez home, Steiber said.

Clay was being held Monday at the Clark County jail pending an initial court appearance on Wednesday.

He is facing charges including murder, kidnapping, assault with a deadly weapon and sex assault that could get him the death penalty.

He is expected to be represented by a Clark County public defender, but no attorney was named to the case as of Monday, said Daren Richards, an administrator in the public defender office.

No suspects have been identified, and Nichols asked for patience, saying rumors were complicating the investigation.

Although police said Monday that evidence didn’t suggest an intruder was responsible for the attacks or that a suspect was on the loose, Nichols later said investigators hadn’t been able to determine exactly what happened in the modest three-bedroom home, or when.

“We’ve ruled out no one. We are looking at every possibility,” Nichols said.

Nichols said Thursday that investigators were being deliberately slow and methodical.

“We want to do everything right,” he said. “This case needs to be solved — the brutal nature of the attacks on a family in their own home.”

Authorities found the girl and the mother, Ignacia Martinez, 38, beaten to death with a blunt instrument in separate bedrooms.

The father, Arturo Martinez, 39, was injured in the living room. The murder weapon has not been identified.

The bodies bore clear evidence of an attack with a blunt object, Clark County Coroner Michael Murphy said. He classified the deaths as homicides.

Arturo Martinez remained hospitalized Thursday at University Medical Center in Las Vegas with what authorities initially described as a severe head injury. Police said they weren’t immediately able to interview him because of his injuries.

The two boys were in protective custody with the Clark County Department of Family Services, where Nichols said child forensic counselors have spoken with the boys but police detectives had not.

“We’re not going to push them,” the police lieutenant said. “You can only imagine what they saw.”

Next-door neighbor and family friend Mark Groenert on Thursday characterized Arturo Martinez as a hard-working electrician who coached boxing in his spare time, kept physically fit and sometimes had disputes with another neighbor about parking.

“There was an altercation Saturday night, Arturo came home really late and one of their trucks was parked in front of his driveway,” Groenert told The Associated Press. “Arturo hit the horn. He just laid on it until somebody came out. They got into a yelling match.”

A Spanish-speaking man who answered the door Thursday at the neighboring home declined immediate comment in English and did not respond later to a telephone message in Spanish.

Nichols said police were aware of what he characterized as an “ongoing conflict” with some neighbors, but said investigators found nothing that they believed precipitated the deadly attack.

Groenert said he used to enjoy tequila and carne asada in the Martinez backyard, and his own grandson sometimes played with the two boys next door.

He said he saw police going into the house on Monday and Arturo Martinez shuffling out the front door before collapsing into unconsciousness.

Groenert said he could tell from questions that police later asked him and his wife that investigators suspected a sex attack.

He said he couldn’t believe Arturo Martinez would harm his family, and said he thought the attacker must have been someone from outside the house.

“Something happened. Somebody invaded his house,” Groenert said. “Somebody’s loose, and they just killed a child and a mother.”