Father’s Killer to Do Time in Youth Facility

A 17-year-old Encino honor student was sentenced in Van Nuys Superior Court Monday to custody of the California Youth Authority for killing his father during an argument over the family car. He will be released within seven years.

Stewart Buskirk, who was enrolled in advanced classes at Birmingham High School in Van Nuys and said he still hopes to attend medical school, pleaded guilty in November to a second-degree murder charge for shooting his father in the back of the head last May. Superior Court Judge James Albracht, who sentenced the youth Monday, said Buskirk could have received 17 years to life in state prison.

Officials Cited Cooperation

Albracht cited Buskirk’s “youth, intelligence, willingness and ability to cooperate” as reasons for turning him over to the youth authority instead of sentencing him to state prison. Deputy Dist. Atty. Robert Imerman, who prosecuted the case, said the authority cannot hold Buskirk, who turns 18 this May, past the age of 25. There is no minimum sentence and the authority determines whether Buskirk will be eligible for earlier release.

The youth killed 49-year-old John Buskirk, an attorney for a Sylmar company that manufactures high-technology medical equipment, on May 6 with a handgun from an extensive firearms collection the elder Buskirk kept at the five-bedroom Encino home he and the boy shared. John Buskirk’s badly decomposed body was found nine days later in a shallow grave in the backyard of the home on Royal Hills Drive.

Court records show that Buskirk reported his father missing the day after the murder and withdrew $90,000 from the elder Buskirk’s money market account later that day, telling a bank employee that the money was to pay for his medical school tuition at UCLA. The money was deposited in a checking account and later recovered by authorities.

According to probation and psychological reports, the boy said his father frequently argued with him over his driving the family’s Audi without permission. Buskirk told officials he “lost control in an emotional situation” when he shot his father.

“I’m really sorry for what I did. I could never do such a thing again,” Buskirk was quoted as telling probation officials. “My dad is gone . . . I only hope I can live my life in a way to make it up to him.”