CALIFORNIA ALBUM : Verdict’s In, but No One Claims Victory : Supporters of black youth convicted of murder say he was denied justice. Prosecutors say entire case is sad.

Offord Rollins IV seemed destined for a future that would make this small farming town proud. The popular Wasco High School student starred on the football team, won a state title in the triple jump and sat on the Student Council.

He talked of making the Olympic team and attending UCLA. In the black communities of Kern County, Rollins was a role model whom parents hoped their kids would emulate.

Then, last August, a month before Rollins was to start his senior year, he was arrested for the murder of his former girlfriend, 17-year-old Maria Madera Rodriguez of nearby Shafter.

When Rollins was released for insufficient evidence, his fans and family gave thanks. But the teen-ager was soon arrested again, and in March went on trial before a jury of 11 whites and one Latino.

Supporters packed the Bakersfield courtroom every day. Out in Wasco, students hung banners proclaiming Rollins’ innocence and wore black bracelets in his honor. Fund-raisers helped pay for his defense.

Prosecutors never turned up a murder weapon or a witness. But in April, the jury determined that Rollins was guilty of first-degree murder.

Blacks in Kern County have been talking about the case ever since. Some mourned the loss of a potential hero. Some were angry.

“When the verdict came down it was a total shock to the black community,” said Irma Carson, the only black member of the Bakersfield School District board. “They believe an African-American male has once again fallen into the hands of injustice.”

Kern County, a conservative farming and oil area, is not an easy place to be an African-American. Whites are very much the majority and Latinos are the most common minority. In the county of 543,000 people, 5% of the population is black.

But Rollins enjoyed his life in Wasco, a community of 11,000 about 30 miles west of Bakersfield. He was born and raised in the area, and lived with his mother, Joy, and younger sister, Annell, in a modest two-bedroom duplex near the high school.

Rollins met Rodriguez in the summer of 1990, and he testified that they dated off and on for several months. At the time of her death, he said, he had a new girlfriend. Rollins said he met with Rodriguez the day before her murder but denies ever seeing her again.

According to sheriff’s reports, Rodriguez was shot in the back and in the left ear Aug. 2, 1991. Her body was dumped in a wooded area next to a canal that runs along California 46, east of Interstate 5 near Lost Hills.

Rodriguez’s mother, Mirian Rodriguez, testified that her daughter talked to Rollins that morning and made plans to meet him at a park in Shafter. Her daughter left shortly after that phone conversation, Mirian testified, and she never saw her again.

Defense attorney Timothy Lemucchi felt that Rollins’ popularity could only help and he did not request a change of venue for the trial.

“Public sentiment certainly seemed to be on his side,” Lemucchi said. “Most of the press had been very positive.”

At the trial, the prosecution presented evidence that Rodriguez’s fingerprints were on the car Rollins drove the day of the murder. Prosecutors also found a witness who reported a car similar to Rollins’ near the murder scene. Bits of a tamarisk plant, common in the Lost Hills area but not Wasco, were found in Rollins’ car.

Investigators also said fibers in the car matched those on the victim’s clothes.

Supporters of Rollins said the circumstantial evidence was not sufficient to consign a young man to life in prison. They also charged that prosecutor Lisa Green pursued a racial strategy to win the conviction.

Four blacks were dismissed during jury selection, leaving none on the panel. Green’s closing argument linked Rollins with boxer Mike Tyson, who had been recently convicted of raping a beauty pageant contestant.

“Mike Tyson is rich and famous and could get lots of girls,” Green told the jury. “He didn’t need to rape that girl to get sex. Sometimes people just do things, and there is no reason for it.”

Earlier this month Rollins’ defense attorney asked for a new trial, charging racism by the prosecution and jury misconduct. But Kern County Superior Court Judge Len McGillivray denied the motion, ruling that prosecutors properly excused the black jury candidates.

“Current law does not give a minority defendant the right to have members of his group on a jury,” McGillivray said. “It requires only that they not be unfairly excluded.”

Holly Okafor, the only black prosecutor in the Kern County district attorney’s office, said the case has been troublesome for her. She felt the verdict was fair and called prosecutor Lisa Green a friend and good attorney.

“But as a black person, I see a kid who had his whole life ahead of him and then he goes to prison for basically the rest of his life--it is very difficult for me to square that,” Okafor said.

The black community has been troubled by this case, she said, because it does not want to see one of its bright stars become another crime statistic. She said it was often difficult being black in Kern County.

“A lot of people here talk to me as a black woman first,” Okafor said. “But when they find out I’m a black woman who is also a deputy district attorney, their tone often changes. That’s what a lot of people face here every day.”

The 35-year-old attorney said she hopes some good can come from the support Rollins has received. She said perhaps the black community can use this as a device to better organize themselves and fight for their rights.

“In my heart, I sure hope he did it,” Okafor said. “Because if not, it would be a great injustice.”

Her boss, Kern County Dist. Atty. Ed Jagels, expresses no doubts.

“His guilt was obvious, I believe, to any objective observer,” Jagels said. “Unfortunately, emotionalism took the place of objective analysis. Kern County generally was very proud of Mr. Rollins and his athletic prowess, and many did not want to believe he could commit such a crime.”

Since the trial, a Justice for Rollins campaign office has opened in Bakersfield to help raise money for legal costs. The group is headed by Offord Rollins III, who gave up his job as a respiratory therapist in Los Angeles to help clear his son’s name.

Rollins said the organization has raised more than $10,000 and will continue to work until the appeals process has been exhausted.

“The trial certainly helped bond a lot of the black people in the community,” the elder Rollins said. “We just don’t know how far this will go.”

His son, now 18, is undergoing a 60-day evaluation by the California Youth Authority in Sacramento.

When he is sentenced later this summer, Offord Rollins IV is expected to receive 28 years to life in prison.

“There are no winners here,” said Green, the deputy district attorney who tried the case. “You have a family who is mourning the brutal death of their daughter, and you have a young man that had a lot to look forward to. I have enjoyed none of this.”