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By Donna
#1463264
By Catherine Saillant, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer
February 16, 2008
With school out Friday, Madel Duran and her 10-year-old son, Victor, knew just how to spend their free afternoon. They made the short trek from their Oxnard home to honor a boy they never knew.

At E.O. Green Junior High School, mother and son placed a hot-pink flower lei and a wooden rosary on a growing makeshift memorial for slain eighth-grader Lawrence King.

Police say the 15-year-old, who students say had been teased at school for his effeminate dress, was gunned down early Tuesday by a student in his English class.

His alleged assailant, Brandon McInerney, 14, has been charged with first-degree murder with the special allegation of a hate crime. He was being held in Juvenile Hall in lieu of $770,000 bail and will be tried as an adult.

"It's a tragedy for Oxnard, because this has never happened before," said Victor, a fifth-grader who expects to attend E.O. Green next fall. "And it should never happen again"

Although other local shootings have occurred near schools or in their common areas, this week's killing inside a classroom was a first for Ventura County, authorities said.

As news of King's killing continued to spread Friday, Oxnard residents said they had been shaken deeply by the sensational crime in their backyard.

"This is a good community filled with good people," said Duran, 40, adding that her older son had gone to E.O. Green with no problems. "This is a good school. What everyone wants to know is: Why did this happen? We don't understand."

An Oxnard father who would identify himself only as Robert said he too was saddened, not only by the senseless loss but by the black eye the week's events might give the city he calls home.

"When you say you're from Oxnard, people always immediately think 'gangs,' " he said as he watched his daughter and her friends frolic outside an ice-cream shop in the city's refurbished downtown. "But it's not all gangs and violence here. It's a friendly place and a good place for families."

The crime rate typically is higher in Oxnard than in Ventura County's other nine cities. The city also has more gang- related crime, prompting police and prosecutors to designate two areas where known gang members are restricted from gathering.

But residents say that is simply a reflection of the city's transformation from a tiny agricultural town, where farmers grew lima beans and sugar beets, to Ventura County's biggest and most diverse city.

Oxnard has an estimated population of 193,000, of which about two-thirds are Latino.

"We're basically a blue- collar community, and some crime goes with it," said Manuel Perez, 81, who was born in Oxnard and has lived in the same home with his wife, Virginia, 79, for five decades. "But it's really a very nice place to live with really good people."

Bullies can be found anywhere, Perez said.

What bothers him about this week's shooting is that it might have been prevented if school officials had more aggressively responded to reports of friction between the two young men.

"Junior high is a critical age, and there are red flags," Perez said. "They're not babies anymore, and they're not in high school. They are just starting to feel their oats."

Organs were taken from King's body Thursday and an autopsy was performed Friday, said Senior Deputy Medical Examiner Craig Stevens. He declined to say what organs were harvested or where they went.

In an interview with the Ventura County Star newspaper, King's father, Greg, said the family believes the donation was the right thing to do. His son was headstrong, artistic and giving, he told the newspaper.

Greg King said seven vital organs were harvested Thursday, adding, "If Larry had the story to write, he'd say, 'If I have to give someone a heart, I want to give it to them on Valentine's Day.' "

The boy's death has prompted vigils, a student-organized march and calls for more attention to anti-gay bullying and harassment in schools.

On Friday, officials at the Gay & Lesbian Center in Los Angeles held a news conference to denounce anti-gay student violence, and a memorial vigil organized by the Ventura County Rainbow Alliance was scheduled for Friday night in Ventura.

A peace march organized by King's classmates at E.O. Green is scheduled for noon today. It will start in a park near the school at 3739 S. 6th St. and continue north through the city to the downtown area.

catherine.saillant@ latimes.com


http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me ... 1816.story
User avatar
By Quercus Robur
#1463281
horrible.. two wasted lives for disgust's sake

on a different note this is the first time I've seen an article with someone frolic in it :)
User avatar
By Goranhammer
#1463293
slain eighth-grader


the 15-year-old


Maybe instead of it being an anti-gay crime, it was an anti-stupid crime. Shit, I was a junior in high school at 15.
Last edited by Goranhammer on 28 Feb 2008 01:06, edited 1 time in total.
User avatar
By NYYS
#1463295
Shit, I was a junior in high school at 15.

Were you young or smart? You're supposed to turn 16 your sophomore year.
User avatar
By Goranhammer
#1463297
According to administrators, both. I do recall not being the only one starting 11th grade at 15.

I think your assessment is a bit on the high side. People who are driving their freshman year of high school had a bright semester or three eating paste, way back when.
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By NYYS
#1463312
I think your assessment is a bit on the high side.

How so? I'm positive a student taking the normal course through school turns 16 their sophomore year.

I'm guessing he had a decent aim.

...and I actually lol'd here.
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By Goranhammer
#1463329
NYYS wrote:How so? I'm positive a student taking the normal course through school turns 16 their sophomore year.


Yeah, I believe that being 16 at the end of your sophomore (10th) is considered the standard range, with 15 being low end. This kid was 15 and in 8th grade. Even assuming he already turned for the year, he still failed one grade, and possibly two.

And it's not even high school. Do you know how fucking stupid someone has to be to fail elementary or junior high? Shit, you'd have to be some kind of kid who starts fires or wears a harness.

Donny wrote:Still playing with your food, Goran?


Hey, it's still a legitimate argument. Okay, maybe I've strayed off the "he's gay" focus and onto the "he's stupid" one, but it's still story-based. Isn't that what you want?
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By Donna
#1463356
Hey, it's still a legitimate argument. Okay, maybe I've strayed off the "he's gay" focus and onto the "he's stupid" one, but it's still story-based. Isn't that what you want?


That he failed a grade is somewhat irrelevant. I expected a larger arsenal from you, Goran - like a diatribe on the percussions of wearing a dress to junior high.
User avatar
By Goranhammer
#1463364
That he failed a grade is somewhat irrelevant. I expected a larger arsenal from you, Goran - like a diatribe on the percussions of wearing a dress to junior high.


Okay, yah...there's nothing moral, normal, or acceptable about some preteen fruit running around in high heels. However, stupidity is a bigger plague in America than homosexuality.

Whatever hith heart dethireth.
User avatar
By Donna
#1463367
I'm only going to say this once.

Deep down inside, you're a homo.
User avatar
By Goranhammer
#1463384
No, I'm not. I just have too much of a comedic side to ignore a good joke.

Personally, I could give a good hot damn if someone is gay as long as they're not doing it in front of me. I don't go around shoving my tongue down some bitch's throat in front of gay dudes, so I should expect the same courtesy. If two guys are drilling for oil in a house somewhere, I don't care and it's not my business.

If I was doing the Idaho Senator song and dance, I'd care more about him being gay than I would him just being a fucking idiot.

I think you're trying to see something that's not there.
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By Red Star
#1463421
I'm guessing he had a decent aim.


That's you at your best. :up:
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By Donna
#1463424
Personally, I could give a good hot damn if someone is gay as long as they're not doing it in front of me. I don't go around shoving my tongue down some bitch's throat in front of gay dudes, so I should expect the same courtesy.


Heh, do you know how often heterosexuality is 'flaunted' in public? Enough that it would simply be mad for any gay person to embalm a personal rectitude over. I have nothing against breeders (they are an evolutionary necessity, after all) but the latest incarnation of sociological heterosexism - the so called 'virtue of the closet' - is merely watered down talk of the old bastion. Come on, Goran. If this was a 70 or a hundred years ago, one could proclaim people like this slain queen as either an unnatural monstrosity or a criminal. Go back even further, maybe 150 to two hundred years, the gayness itself would be a horror, a terror, a subversion so wicked that only severe chastization could remedy.

A queer is just a queer. They're going to kiss, hold hands in public etc. not because they have something to prove - or to troll your precious vanguard, but simply because they no longer feel threatened to do so. I suppose that is my point - catharsis; if you cannot do anything about it (short of breaking the law, assaulting them) then what is the point of filling this mental vacuum with indignity? This whole non-conformist showdown with intractable phases of culture and society is simply likened to regression as I see it.
User avatar
By Nets
#1463430
**Waiting for Kummatto to show up bitching about how this isn't real news and he has been inconvenienced by the thread**

Seriously though, this is awful. Lock this kid up and throw away the key -- yes he's a minor but cold blooded-ly murdering your classmate is unforgivable.
User avatar
By QatzelOk
#1463442
Goranhammer wrote:I'm guessing he had a decent aim.

Hey, I have pretty decent aim myself.

This guy was murdered because sexually ignorant high school students tried to define their non-existent heterosexuality by loathing the "other."

This is very typical behavior of non-educated adolescents. Though it is a bit more disappointing when the same kind of desperate anti-gay spirit defines an adult, like Goranhammer. Surely you have something other than fag jokes to show for your love of women, Goran.

Anyway, I think the story underscores the importance of improved education regarding sexuality at an early age. Boys have got to be taught that hating gays is not an acceptable way of defining your heterosexuality, any more than hating Arabs is an acceptable way of defining your Western-ness or American-ness.
By keso
#1463553
Shit, I was a junior in high school at 15.



From the way you post, it sound like you never left.
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By Athanas
#1463616
To think this can still happen in the modern 'tolerant' age, what a terrible reflection on society. Thank goodness Gay panic no longer holds true in the court system as justifiable defense. People like Slayers of Cliffracers need to witness that hate crimes do exist and homosexuals and transgenders are always at peril. Intolerance and hate for something so minor as gender role and identity can inspire such violence. Yet there are those who claim homosexuals have an agenda, if equal treatment and tolerance is political motivation, then by all means they are guilty of trying to change the system, no more than blacks did in the 1960s.

EDIT:

Is it just me or does everybody find Goranhammer extremely disturbing and offensive?
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