Man Angry Over Sentence for Grandson’s Killer

Five years ago, Bernard Babcock’s grandson was robbed and beaten to death outside a Harbor City nightclub.

At least once a month after the killing, Babcock, now 73, called detectives in the Los Angeles Police Department’s Harbor Division to check on the case.

Kenneth Guido, 22, was more than a grandson to Babcock of Gardena. They lived together and were buddies, Babcock said.

“I didn’t want them to forget the case,” Babcock said recently. “I felt the more I called them, the more they wouldn’t forget the case.”

Five years has been a long time for Babcock to wait for justice, and he still is not satisfied.

True, on Nov. 30 in Long Beach Superior Court, James (Jamie) Rhymes of Lomita pleaded guilty to voluntary manslaughter and was sentenced to 8 years in state prison. But with credit for prison work and good behavior, he could be out in 4 years.

“An injustice has been done,” Babcock said. “He got 8 years for murdering my grandson. If this is justice, then my name is not Bernard Neil Babcock.”

Testimony Recanted

The prosecutor and the chief investigator in the case said they, too, are disappointed that they did not have enough evidence to convict Rhymes of first-degree murder. But the 8-year sentence was the best they could hope for, they said, after the prosecution’s star witness recanted his testimony and after a new policy in the district attorney’s office prevented use of incriminating statements by three jailhouse informants.

Rhymes’ attorney declined to comment.

When the tanker Stuyvesant docked in San Pedro about 8 p.m. on Dec. 9, 1983, Guido called his grandfather to say he would not be coming home that night.

The young seaman received $408 in cash and a paycheck for $1,400 when he left the ship, according to a police report and other records.

Guido made his way to Cheers, a since-defunct Harbor City nightclub.

He bought a couple of drinks that he paid for from a thick wad of bills that he pulled from his pocket. A waitress warned him about exposing so much cash.

Jamie Rhymes, then 23, had been paroled from state prison 2 weeks before, after serving a year for severely injuring a man in an assault case.

He arrived at Cheers a short time after Guido and joined the merchant seaman at his table, witnesses said. The two men did not appear to know each other.

They left the bar together a few minutes later, bouncers told detectives. Bar employees told police that Rhymes returned to the bar 15 or 20 minutes later but Guido never came back.

He was found after midnight, lying in a coma with severe head injuries in a parking lot near the bar. Guido died 2 days later.