Convicted Slayer Admits in Court He Strangled Boy

A man convicted of kidnaping and killing a 10-year-old West Covina boy in 1980 admitted his guilt for the first time in court Monday as he testified for the city in a wrongful death suit brought by the victim’s father.

Danny Jerome Young, 29, said he was testifying on behalf of the city in the $10-million suit to set the record straight and remove any blame from the police who handled the murder case.

“The only person who could have saved Ronnie Tolleson was God,” Young testified in Pomona Superior Court.

Young is serving a life term without possibility of parole for the slaying.

Eight days after Ronald Tolleson Jr. was abducted and $3,000 was demanded in ransom, the boy’s strangled body was found in the garage of a home two doors away from the Tolleson residence. Young lived in the home with his sister.

Suing West Covina

Ronald A. Tolleson Sr. is suing the West Covina Police Department, Police Chief Craig Meacham and two officers, alleging that police botched the investigation.

A Pomona Superior Court judge ruled that there was insufficient evidence to warrant a trial.

But a state Court of Appeal ruled that the case could be heard, a decision that the state Supreme Court affirmed early last year.

State Appellate Justice Campbell M. Lucas had concluded that police searched the Young house the night of the kidnaping but did not enter the garage. Lucas also found that a suspect was not apprehended, even though several police officers were stationed near the site where the ransom was to be placed and one officer saw a man pick up the money. The ransom bag contained $100, all the senior Tolleson could raise, and crumpled newspapers.

The city’s defense attorney, Thomas J. Feeley, has maintained that the boy was dead before police were contacted and that the suit should be dropped.

Young, who was convicted in 1982 of second-degree murder and kidnaping, testified Monday that he strangled the boy with an electrical cord within hours after abducting him.

Although Young pleaded not guilty, the prosecution introduced a taped confession obtained by police.

Young maintained during his trial that the confession was coerced. On Monday, he admitted that he had lied.

“I don’t think that careers should be in jeopardy for something I did,” said Young, as he unemotionally told how he killed Tolleson. “Even if this causes my life to be terminated in the penitentiary, I got to do it. I can’t lay back.”

Nothing to Gain

Feeley said Young has nothing to gain by his testimony.

“He’s serving life without the possibility of parole . . . I’m not aware of anything you can offer a person in those circumstances,” he said.

But Tolleson’s attorneys, Charles C. Simon and Peter M. Wucetich, said they believe Young was offered some inducement.

“It’s certainly not out of the goodness of his heart for the city of West Covina and the police officers who put him away,” Wucetich said.

Young testified Monday that the boy came to his house looking for Young’s nephews.

Young said he lured Tolleson into his room and bound and gagged him. He said he demanded the boy’s phone number, “because I knew at the time that I was going to kill him.”

He then took Tolleson to a downstairs bathroom, where he strangled him. After wrapping the body in blankets, Young said he stuffed it behind a sofa in the garage.

Phoned House

That afternoon, he phoned the Tolleson house and demanded $3,000, Young said.

“Was Ronnie already dead at that point?” Feeley asked.

“Yes,” Young said.

Young said he persuaded an acquaintance to pick up the ransom at a local park, by telling him that he was obtaining a bag of marijuana. While watching the drop site at Rimgrove Park, Young said he saw police officers “all over” after the man picked up the bag.

Young was captured in Nevada a month after the slaying.