McInerney pleads not guilty, lawyer calls charges 'death sentence'

[Shana A]

McInerney pleads not guilty, lawyer calls charges 'death sentence'
Preliminary hearing set for Sept. 23

By Kathleen Wilson (Contact)
Friday, August 8, 2008

http://www.venturacountystar.com/news/2008/aug/08/mcinerney-pleads-not-guilty/

The 14-year-old boy accused of killing eighth-grader Larry King pleaded not guilty Thursday to premeditated murder and a hate crime, charges his attorney said could mean dying in prison unless the youth can be tried on the lesser charge of manslaughter.

"This is essentially a death sentence for Brandon McInerney," defense attorney William "Willy" Quest said after entering a plea of not guilty for his client.

[tekla]

He BROUGHT the gun with him, that is pre-meditation, and that's murder one.

[Laura91]

He BROUGHT the gun with him, that is pre-meditation, and that's murder one.

Indeed. That little scumbag knew what he was doing and they should lock him up for the rest of his life for what he did.

[tekla]

Middle class white kid in the gang-run California prison system, he ain't gonna last long.

[Laura91]

  Yeah, that's true

[Sandy]

He BROUGHT the gun with him, that is pre-meditation, and that's murder one.

Indeed. That little scumbag knew what he was doing and they should lock him up for the rest of his life for what he did.

Will you feel vindicated when this child gets shivved by a gang member?  Will the death of King have been properly adjudicated by that?

Will the death of McInerney bring King back?

Have we become the lynch mob that we so desperately fled?

I am in no way defending McInerney or say he should be freed because he is a teen.  It's just that I feel that having him spend the rest of his life in jail being tried as an adult for a hate crime, destroys two lives and decimates two families.

-Sandy

[tekla]

Will I feel vindicated?  No.  Will I lose sleep over it?  No.

I spend a lot of time in my life doing two activities that are very dangerous.  Rock climbing and out-of-bounds skiing.  On more than one occasion, in each activity I was in a situation where I thought "OK, this is it, I'm going to die."  And the second thought I had in each one of those moments was "Well, it was my choice."  So no whining, no crying, no feeling sorry for myself.  I chose to ski off the backside of that mountain and out into the wilderness of the high Sierra.  You figure that I was smart enough to read the map that called that section of the planet "Desolation Wilderness" and that I had some idea of what that meant.  At least the 'wilderness' part - I was experiencing the 'desolation' part of it as I went.

My choice.  Had I not made it out by nightfall, I would have froze to death most likely and whose to say that I didn't deserve it?

When that sling broke on me down in Pinnacles, well I chose not to check the equipment - a mistake I would never repeat.  But, my bad, and I almost paid for it with my life, had my friend not been in the one exact spot that could save me I would have been some gooey mush at the bottom of the hill.  Like I said, my bad.

So, at the moment he picked up that gun, (not even the moment he pulled the trigger) he was making a choice.  He is old enough to know that shooting people will get you tossed in jail.  Doing it in front of witnesses, well that's real dumb, but ....

And, everyone knows that jail is bad, and prison is worse, and prison in California is very, very bad.  What between the Aryans, MS-13, the Crips and the Bloods its not a good place to be.  And even though he will go to the CYA for a few years before the big time - Soladad, Folsom, San Quentin, those CYA maximum security places are not filled with kids who stole a bike. 

So, he made that choice when he made his choice.  Its tough, its rough justice.  But its his choice.

That kid destroyed those families.  Not the court system.  Not me.  Not society.  He did the moment he picked up that gun and said "I'm going to shot him."

[Laura91]

Will the death of McInerney bring King back?

Have we become the lynch mob that we so desperately fled?



-Sandy
[/quote]

No and in my case no. I don't see it so much as a "lynch mob" mentality more like true justice being served. I don't think that anyone should be murdered in cold blood whether they are trans or not. I do however believe in people getting what they deserve and that little punk would deserve to be killed in prison as far as I am concerned. This may seem harsh to some people but think about it this way: If that kid had got away with what he did and was set free (due to some legal clause) I would bet you that he would react the same way if it were a similar situation just with a different individual. So by getting rid of this piece of human garbage you could be potentially saving others in the process. As far as the grieving families go: I feel sorry for the family of the person who was murdered and as far as the other family goes they obviously were dismal failures as parents.

[tekla]

Its not a lynch mob anyway.  A lynch mob is a group of (normally) good moral people infected with a blood lust mob mentality.

What we have here is some kid who thought he was some Stone Cold Killa, and now - by his choice, and by his choice alone - he is going to meet lots of other stone cold killas.  Welcome to the Jungle.

[joannatsf]

It was a horrible thing that he did but he IS a child.  At his young age there is a very real possibility of rehabilitation and maybe even redemption.  I'm sure we would all find it deplorable for a 14 year old boy to be anally raped in our community.  Do a set of walls placing the child out of sight and out of mind make it ok?



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[tekla]

The juvenile justice system was set up to deal with kids stealing bikes, or shoplifting or being a habitual truant - it was not set up to deal with people who pick up a gun, carry it to the place, pull it out, aim it and pull the trigger on an unarmed and defenseless person.

Had he just been in a quick fight, pushed the other kid, who not being too coordinated fell backwards, hit his head and died - that's manslaughter.  He did not intend for the other person to die.  Bringing a gun has only one outcome, and it's killing the person.  (if he did not intend to kill him he should have shot him in the kneecap not in the body or head)

There are at least five points along that route that you have the choice to change your mind.  You can not pick up the gun.  You can choose not to carry it.  You can choose not to pull it out.  You can choose not to point it.  You can choose not to pull the trigger. Five times he made a choice to kill that person.  That's enough for me.

That 'rant' was, I thought, was a mini essay on choice and responsibility.  As it turns out I was 16 when both of those events happened to me.  Not much different from 14.  But who could have said "gee tekla, you were stupid and pretty much got what was coming to you, skiing off the back of a mountain, not checking your equipment?" 

We all make choices, and we all have to live - or die - with them.

The Catholic church sees the 'age of reason' beginning at about 7, and having raised a few kids, I'm not all that sure they are wrong.  7 is when you know enough to know right from wrong and choose wrong.

He chose wrong.

I don't feel bad about what's about to go down.

[joannatsf]

Tekla, the Catholic Church also thinks we're all perverts that should burn in hell.  Birth control ad condoms to prevent HIV spread are mortal sins as well.

How about a little science Scarecrow!

http://www.nimh.nih.gov/health/publications/teenage-brain-a-work-in-progress.shtml

Advancements in MRI image analysis are providing new insights into how the brain develops. UCLA's Dr. Arthur Toga and colleagues turned the NIMH team's MRI scan data into 4-D time-lapse animations of children's brains morphing as they grow up—the 4th dimension being rate-of-change.3 Researchers report a wave of white matter growth that begins at the front of the brain in early childhood, moves rearward, and then subsides after puberty. Striking growth spurts can be seen from ages 6 to 13 in areas connecting brain regions specialized for language and understanding spatial relations, the temporal and parietal lobes. This growth drops off sharply after age 12, coinciding with the end of a critical period for learning languages.

While this work suggests a wave of brain white matter development that flows from front to back, animal, functional brain imaging and postmortem studies have suggested that gray matter maturation flows in the opposite direction, with the frontal lobes not fully maturing until young adulthood. To confirm this in living humans, the UCLA researchers compared MRI scans of young adults, 23-30, with those of teens, 12-16.4 They looked for signs of myelin, which would imply more mature, efficient connections, within gray matter. As expected, areas of the frontal lobe showed the largest differences between young adults and teens. This increased myelination in the adult frontal cortex likely relates to the maturation of cognitive processing and other "executive" functions. Parietal and temporal areas mediating spatial, sensory, auditory and language functions appeared largely mature in the teen brain. The observed late maturation of the frontal lobe conspicuously coincides with the typical age-of-onset of schizophrenia—late teens, early twenties—which, as noted earlier, is characterized by impaired "executive" functioning.

The guy is not an adult!

[Mnemosyne]

The scumbag decided to carry out a big crime. He did the one thing that no one can ever, ever take back. Took the life of another person. Lock him up, give him a death sentence, whatever. Just make sure that he can never, ever take another life. Give this scumbag a slap on the wrist (and that is what the juvie system amounts to) and he will kill again.

[joannatsf]

Brandon McInerney is a child.  He did a terrible thing and society needs to be protected from him at present.  Justice also demands some form of punishment.  As curently charged, and their is little dispute over the facts, Brandon will recieve a life sentence that will require he serve 51 years in prison.  That makes him eligable for parole when he's 65 years old.  The sentence will be listed as a human rights violation by Amnesty International along with those of Radavan Karadjic and George W. Bush.

A coalition of 27 groups fighting for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender rights today is urging Ventura County prosecutors to try 14-year-old Brandon McInerney in juvenile court, and not as an adult. McInerney has been charged as an adult in the February 12 murder of his E.O. Green Middle School classmate, 15-year-old Lawrence King. Students say McInerney targeted King because the victim was openly gay and because he wore women's jewellery and makeup.

LGBT civil rights organizations, including Lambda Legal, the National Center for Lesbian Rights, and the Transgender Law Center, have delivered a short statement to Ventura County District Attorney Gregory D. Totten, calling on him to try McInerney as a juvenile.

"We are saddened and outraged by the murder of junior high school student Lawrence King," the statement reads. "At the same time, we call on prosecutors not to compound this tragedy with another wrong "we call on them to treat the suspect as a juvenile, not as an adult.

"The facts in this matter seem clear: one boy killed another in a climate of intolerance and fear about sexual orientation and gender expression. The alleged perpetrator, who turned 14 years old less than three weeks before the shooting, should be held accountable for his actions. But we support the principles underlying our juvenile justice system that treat children differently than adults and provide greater hope and opportunity for rehabilitation. In addition, public safety is not served by treating children as adults. According to research released by the Centers for Disease Control in 2006, children transferred to adult court are more likely to re-offend than those committing similar offenses who remain in the juvenile justice system. California law does not require District Attorneys to prosecute 14 year-olds as adults, even in circumstances such as these, and we oppose them doing so. We are issuing this joint statement because we believe so strongly in principles of justice that protect all our young people and know that, even in the face of strong emotions, we should not abandon them. We refuse to let our sense of outrage blind us to the fact that the suspect is only 14 years old.

"Prosecuting the alleged perpetrator as an adult will not bring Lawrence King back nor will it make schools safer for LGBT youth. We must respond to this tragedy by strengthening our resolve to change the climate in schools, eliminate bigotry based on sexual orientation, gender identity or expression and hold schools responsible for protecting students against discrimination and physical harm."

The list of signatories include: American Civil Liberties Union of Northern California; American Civil Liberties Union of San Diego and Imperial Counties; American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California; Ally Action (CA); Children of Lesbians and Gays Everywhere (COLAGE; national); Community United Against Violence (San Francisco); Different Avenues (DC); Equality California; Gay Straight Alliance Network (CA); Gay & Lesbian Advocates & Defenders (GLAD); Human Rights Campaign; LAGAI - Queer Insurrection; Lambda Legal; LifeWorks Mentoring (Los Angeles); Los Angeles Gay and Lesbian Center; National Black Justice Coalition; National Center for Lesbian Rights; National Center for Transgender Equality; National Gay and Lesbian Task Force; Parents, Families and Friends of Lesbians and Gays (PFLAG) National; Safe Schools Coalition; San Francisco LGBT Community Center; Sylvia Rivera Law Project (New York); TGI Justice Project (CA); Transgender Law Center; The Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual & Transgender Community Center (NY); TransYouth Family Allies, Inc.

[tekla]

I don't support 'hate crimes' stuff, so I would toss that, and the use of a gun charge is BS too, its a simple murder one, 25-years to life, which will put him in CYA till he is 18, and then into the larger system.  He ought to be out by the time he is 35 with good behavior.  But often a juvie trial carries only a juvie sentence, which would have him serving all of 4 years, which does not seem right.

[joannatsf]

I don't support 'hate crimes' stuff, so I would toss that, and the use of a gun charge is BS too, its a simple murder one, 25-years to life, which will put him in CYA till he is 18, and then into the larger system.  He ought to be out by the time he is 35 with good behavior.  But often a juvie trial carries only a juvie sentence, which would have him serving all of 4 years, which does not seem right.

A person can be committed to the CYA  until 25 yoa.  I favour an greater emphasis on rehabilitation than on punishment.

[tekla]

Even then, that's only ten years, not enough.  I have no idea how to 'rehabilitate' someone this cold blooded, its not like hes a car thief who needs some new and different job skills to get them out of the GTA racket.

[Mnemosyne]

Two studies showed that violent felons usually carry out about 15 felony crimes in their criminal career and a small percentage of them are responsible for 50% of reported violent crimes each year (both studies are dated and I have not seen any follow up research). If he is found guilty, lock him up for a very long time.

[lacitychick21]

The kid is 14! He's stupid, stupid, stupid!! UNFATHOMABLE! But to be tried as an adult?! He is not, and I don't think he should. I think back to when I was 14; I couldn't even fathom such a thing because at that age... my parents were instrumental in shaping my values and influencing my actions.

From what I hear, the kid was a punk anyway. I'm sure he was on his way to a life-long relationship with the justice system, but geez, the death sentence for a 14-year-old boy.

I say, give both the boy and his parents manslaughter.

[BeverlyAnn]

As far as I'm concerned, it doesn't matter whether he's 14 or 44.  As Tekla pointed out, he had five points at which he could have stopped.  This was nothing but a cold blooded execution.  It was not an accidental discharge of a firearm, it was not manslaughter, it was not a car theft, it was not a burglary.  It was not something where we can say "Oh well, he's a kid and kids will be kids."  He simply blew this kids brains all over his classmates by putting two rounds (not one, TWO) into the back of Lawrence's head. Premeditated stone cold murder.  Brandon McInerney is walking around today.  Can you say the same for Lawrence King.

It was not a hate crime but we had something similar here a few months ago.  A 17 year old walked up to another youth, pulled a pistol and put a round right into his forehead.  Because our idiot (and soon to be out of office) District Attorney did not present the case to the Grand Jury within 180 days as is required by Georgia law when a juvenile is involved, this cold blooded killer will be tried in juvy court.  He will most likely be well past his 18th birthday by the time he's convicted meaning he will spend less thanthree years in jail for murder.  Gee, I'm sure he'll learn his lesson from that.  I'm sure a short sentence will teach Brandon McInerney a lesson too.

I am normally an easy going person but I'm going to state here that, if my passion for justice offends anyone, I don't care.  When one of your best friends is found in her driveway with a bullet in the back of her head and the police only go through the motions because she was TG and never caught anyone, it colors the way you think of these types of cases.

Beverly