Posted on Advocate.com August 26, 2011 06:35:00 PM ET
Fate of King's Shooter Now in Jury's Hands
By Neal Broverman
http://www.advocate.com/News/Daily_News/2011/08/26/Fate_of_Kings_Shooter_Now_in_Jurys_Hands/ (http://www.advocate.com/News/Daily_News/2011/08/26/Fate_of_Kings_Shooter_Now_in_Jurys_Hands/)
After the defense concluded its arguments in the Brandon McInerney murder trial today, attorney Scott Wippert continued to paint McInerney as a victim of the effeminate Lawrence King, while in a final rebuttal, Ventura County senior deputy district attorney Maeve Fox pleaded with the jury to not let sympathy toward McInerney or bias toward gay people sway them from a first-degree murder conviction.
The proceedings in a Chatsworth, Calif., courtroom ended yesterday before Wippert could wrap up his concluding statements in the trial of McInerney, who shot 15-year-old King twice in the head in February 2008 at Oxnard, Calif.'s E.O. Green Middle School. For much of Friday morning, Wippert repeated his points from the previous day, saying King's alleged flirtation and effeminate manner helped pushed McInerney "to his limit," therefore justifying a manslaughter conviction, not first- or second-degree murder.
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Case against Southern California teen accused of murdering gay classmate goes to jury
By Associated Press, Published: August 26
http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/case-against-southern-california-teen-accused-of-murdering-gay-classmate-goes-to-jury/2011/08/26/gIQAWNUygJ_story.html (http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/case-against-southern-california-teen-accused-of-murdering-gay-classmate-goes-to-jury/2011/08/26/gIQAWNUygJ_story.html)
Jurors began deliberations Friday after a lumbering trial that at times seemed to get bogged down with rambling testimonies and legal objections, including unsuccessful defense motions for a mistrial.
McInerney's lawyers do not dispute their client took a .22-caliber handgun from home, brought it to school and shot King in the head in front of horrified classmates in February 2008, but they want the jury to convict him of voluntary manslaughter instead of first-degree murder with a hate-crime enhancement, potentially shaving decades off any prison sentence.