Jurors Plead for Leniency : Youth Who Killed His Guardian Is Set Free

As an Orange County courtroom erupted in cheers, a Superior Court judge Friday placed an 18-year-old youth convicted of killing his guardian on probation and freed him.

The Dana Point youth, facing a sentence for manslaughter, was allowed to walk out of the courtroom after all 12 jurors begged the judge not to send him to jail.

“A lot of people have placed an awful lot of trust in you; they obviously believe you are a very special young man,” Judge Robert R. Fitzgerald told the defendant, Joeri DeBeer.

DeBeer, after a long round of hugs from his supporters in the courtroom, said he was surprised to be freed, but had hoped for it.

“It’s still unbelievable that all these people have cared about me like this,” DeBeer said.

DeBeer was convicted last month of voluntary manslaughter in the April 9, 1985, shooting death of his legal guardian, Phillip A. Parsons. In court, DeBeer testified that Parsons, a convicted child molester, began to “use him” sexually four to five times a week.

Parsons had reportedly molested DeBeer numerous times over a four-year period.

Fitzgerald accepted an offer by Syd and Jenny Ward, acquaintances of DeBeer through one of their sons, to let him live with them at their home in Oakley in Contra Costa County. He sentenced DeBeer to three years’ probation plus the 14 months DeBeer has already served at Juvenile Hall.

Fitzgerald also took the unusual step of letting DeBeer walk free immediately. In most cases, even Juvenile Hall inmates are ordered to return to the facility to be officially checked out.

In a prelude to what amounted to one of the most unusual and dramatic courtroom scenes ever witnessed in Orange County, a parade of witnesses spoke on behalf of the teen-ager.

Jenny Ward, the 12 jurors who convicted DeBeer and and even an alternate juror all told the judge that DeBeer deserved special consideration because of the circumstances he was living.

“He is a victim of society,” jury Foreman Gary Carriger told the court. “We as society allowed this to happen. . . . He has already lived in prison for four years. There were no bars, but also no path for escape.”

One juror, Patricia de Carion, who referred to DeBeer as “my new special friend,” told the judge that society was at fault for allowing people like Parsons back onto the street without adequate treatment.

“He has protected himself and unknown numbers of our children from this man,” she said. “Joeri is not a menace to society. We need to hope for his forgiveness.”

Jurors Visit Him

More than half the jurors said they had visited DeBeer at Juvenile Hall and were impressed with the kind of person he was.

DeBeer told Fitzgerald that he wanted to continue his education and get a job. “I have goals. . . . I want to work with kids. I don’t want them to go through what I went through.”

Jenny Ward said later that “my heart started pumping very quickly when the judge said he could go; a lot of people have worked awfully hard the last few months to make this happen.”

DeBeer faced a possible 14 years and eight months in prison, but the usual sentence for defendants his age found guilty of manslaughter is commitment to the California Youth Authority.

Unique Individual

DeBeer’s attorney, Gary Proctor, argued that the jurors would not have returned to speak on his behalf if they did not consider him a unique individual.

Fitzgerald asked Proctor what the answer should be to those who say, “Here’s another liberal judge letting another killer go free.”

Proctor answered that no one in the courtroom was there because they wanted to see DeBeer go to prison.

DeBeer is a native of the Netherlands. He met Parsons in Saudi Arabia, where DeBeer’s mother had taken him after remarrying. Parsons offered to bring the boy, then 13, to the United States and promised to make a motorcycle racing champion of him and to become his guardian. DeBeer’s family was unaware of Parsons’ convictions for child molesting. It was through motorcycle racing that DeBeer got to know the Ward family.

One Dissenting Voice

The only dissenting voice in the courtroom came from Deputy Dist. Atty. Mel Jensen. Jensen did not recommend that DeBeer go to state prison. But he did ask for a 90-day diagnostic study from the California Youth Authority to help the court decide on either a prison term, commitment to the Youth Authority or probation. Fitzgerald said that was not necessary.

Fitzgerald did ask “if there is anyone in this room, besides Mr. Jensen, who does not think I should give the defendant probation?” It appeared that no one even breathed.

It all began, Proctor said, when first one juror called him asking permission to see DeBeer at Juvenile Hall, then a second, then a third. Finally all the jurors agreed that they wanted to help Proctor get probation for DeBeer.

“Without those jurors coming back, he would have been sentenced to the Youth Authority,” Proctor said.

Jensen certainly did not get caught up in the spirit inside the courtroom. He said later: “Use a gun and go to college. That’s the new line at Juvenile Hall.”

Times staff writer David Reyes contributed to this report.