Murder Trial Rejected in Death of Teen-Ager : Courts: A judge says a man accused of recruiting boys into a burglary ring cannot be held liable after a youth was fatally hurt in a break-in.

A judge ruled Monday that a Reseda man accused of recruiting young boys into a burglary ring cannot be tried for murder in the accidental death of one the youths that allegedly occurred during a break-in.

But a prosecutor vowed to promptly refile the second-degree murder charge in Superior Court against Julio Grassano, 23, saying “this was murder, not an accident.”

Van Nuys Municipal Judge Robert Swasey said Grassano can be tried for child endangerment and burglary in the case, but cannot be held to answer for murder in the death of 13-year-old Donald K. Saravia.

The boy was fatally injured April 10 when glass from a window at a shop he had broken into fell on his neck and sliced open one of his carotid arteries, authorities say.

Saravia, an eighth-grader at Portola Junior High School in Tarzana, died at Northridge Hospital Medical Center, where he had been dropped off by Grassano shortly after the early-morning incident.

Police have likened Grassano to Fagin, the character in Charles Dickens’ novel “Oliver Twist,” who recruited young boys to steal for him.

According to testimony introduced at a preliming hearing in Swasey’s court, the group roamed the San Fernando Valley breaking into cars, chiefly to steal stereos, which they traded for rock cocaine.

Grassano, who had a car and was the lone adult in the group, recruited the boys and drove them to and from the break-in sites, police testified.

At the preliminary hearing, Deputy Dist. Atty. David Campbell argued that Grassano is guilty of murder in Saravia’s death because he “placed the boy in a life-threatening situation over and over.”

“That’s felony child abuse, and it led to the boy’s death, and that makes it murder,” he said.

Campbell said Monday that he will refile the murder charge at Grassano’s June 24 arraignment in Superior Court on child endangerment and burglary charges that were upheld by Swasey.

The prosecutor acknowledged that appellate court decisions in similar cases have reached varying conclusions about whether a death that occurs during the commission of child endangerment can be murder.

Grassano’s attorney, Irwin Pransky, contended that the death was an accident caused by Saravia’s own actions.

Noting that Grassano rushed the boy to the hospital, Pransky said it would be a “terrible injustice” to try his client for murder.

A second-degree murder conviction carries a penalty of 15 years to life in prison.

If convicted of child endangerment and burglary, Grassano faces a maximum of six years, eight months in prison, Campbell said.

After his ruling, Swasey reduced Grassano’s bail to $200,000. He had been held without bail since his arrest April 12.