Judge Convicts Man in ’88 Racial Shooting of Black

A former research scientist was convicted Wednesday of attempted murder, civil rights violations and other charges for the racially motivated shooting of a black teen-ager who had gone fishing with his cousins at Ballona Creek in Playa del Rey.

Mark Shane Lashley, 29, was taken into custody at Torrance Superior Court immediately after Judge John P. Shook announced the verdict at the end of a six-week non-jury trial. Lashley will face up to 14 years and 8 months in prison when he is sentenced by Shook April 25.

Terence Goudeau, 20, who still has fragments of a .22-caliber bullet lodged near his spine from the 1988 shooting, hugged Deputy Dist. Atty. Robert Martin after the verdict.

“I feel the same about everybody,” said the soft-spoken Goudeau. “There are no bad feelings. (Lashley’s) a human being, but he did the wrong thing to another human being.

“I hope he will straighten up and stop being racist.”

Lashley, who had been free on $200,000 bail, appeared stoical as the judge summarized the evidence that led to his ruling. He embraced his attorney, Lloyd Riley, before being led away by a bailiff.

Shook said the case was a sad one in many ways--because of the suffering of Goudeau, the fear and anxiety for his cousins and the worry for Lashley’s parents.

“But I think the saddest thing of all in this case,” said Shook, “is that it appears the defendant acted on this occasion out of pure, unadulterated racial hatred.”

On June 26, 1988, Goudeau and his three cousins--brothers Dennis, Kelvin and Trenton Wilson--drove from their homes in South-Central Los Angeles to fish and relax at the creek, near the entrance to Marina del Rey, they testified.

The young men, who ranged in age from 12 to 23, testified that Lashley and his cousin, Christopher Flores, taunted them from the balcony of Lashley’s nearby apartment and yelled racial slurs.

Goudeau said Lashley threatened to send “his boys” down to fight the “biggest and darkest” member of the fishing party, a reference to the overweight Trenton, 12.

The black youths said that Flores, apparently drunk, staggered down to the creek and, after seeing Goudeau holding a fishing knife, threatened: “You’ve got a knife. I’ll show you a knife!”

When Flores retreated to the apartment building’s carport, Lashley appeared on his balcony with a rifle. As they scattered, with Goudeau running to shield Trenton, a bullet ripped through Goudeau’s arm and into his chest.

Lashley admitted that he fled shortly after the shooting, driving to his parents’ house in Sacramento and stopping along Interstate 5 to hide the rifle in a storm drain.

Lashley said he feared for his own life, but prosecutor Martin said he left “because he knew he did wrong.”

Judge Shook said he found implausible Lashley’s version of events. The former Hughes Aircraft scientist said he shot Goudeau because he and his cousins surrounded Flores and lunged at him with their fishing knives.

Two apartment building tenants said Flores was nowhere in sight immediately after the shooting. Police said Flores told them that he was in the carport at the time the shot was fired.

The judge convicted Lashley of attempted murder, assault with a deadly weapon, brandishing a firearm and two civil rights violations.