Crowd Voices Its Concerns at Sunny Hills

More than 800 people crowded into the Sunny Hills High School gymnasium Wednesday night seeking answers to questions that have haunted them since the arrest of five students there for the brutal slaying of Stuart A. Tay.

The emotional crowd, still reeling from the New Year’s Eve killing of the Foothill High School honor student, included students and parents who worried aloud about safety, the presence of gangs and the availability of drugs and weapons on campus.

“I think good human values have been lost in this day of Nintendo, electronics and computers,” said Herm San Luis, whose 15-year-old son attends Sunny Hills. “You don’t know if you have a time bomb ticking at home. I’m here to know what the school is going to do.”

Hilda Sugarman, president of the school’s Parents, Teachers and Students Assn., said the killing and arrests at Sunny Hills continue to rock the community.

“The overwhelming response showed that people in the community are concerned,” Sugarman said, referring to large turnout. “There is great concern. The five students arrested was something that shocked our entire population.”

Authorities allege that students Robert Chien-Nan Chan, 18, Charles Choe, 17, Kirn Young Kim, 16, Mun Bong Kang, 17, and Abraham Acosta, 16, participated in the killing of Tay when a scheme to rob an Anaheim man of computer components went bad.

Investigators said that Tay was lured to Acosta’s house in Buena Park on New Year’s Eve on the pretense that he would be able to buy a handgun. But as part of a plan that was allegedly devised about two weeks in advance of the meeting, Tay was beaten with baseball bats and a sledgehammer and then buried in a shallow grave. Police estimated that Tay was struck 13 times in the head.

Responding to the concerns of students and parents, Fullerton Unified School District officials organized the forum that included Fullerton police, educators and psychologists. The district also provided a Korean translator. There is a significant Korean population in Fullerton, and three of the five suspects held in the murder are Korean-Americans.

Attendance was so great that the program was moved from the smaller performing arts center on campus to the school gymnasium.

By the time the program had started, the gymnasium bleachers were packed. Many stood in lines that snaked behind two microphones placed on the gym floor, waiting for a chance to speak. Once they were given the floor, their voices cracked with emotion and their words were often followed by thunderous applause.

“My son was killed last week. My five sons are in custody tonight,” one man told the crowd, referring generally to the suspects and victim. “They are all my children. They are all your children.” Later, the man declined to give his name.

Cherene Raphael, a parent of two Sunny Hills students, said she worried that too much emphasis has been placed on children obtaining good grades and too little attention had been given to the personal needs of youths.

“I’m not here to bad-mouth Sunny Hills; my children love Sunny Hills,” she told the crowd. “But when I heard about this, I was devastated. I couldn’t sleep. . . . This is not a racial issue. It’s a moral issue. How, morally, could this have happened? How, morally, could these children have committed this act?”

A majority of the audience consisted of Asian residents, some of whom agreed that the drive for scholastic excellence could be a source of problems for youths in the community. The broad academic achievements of Tay and Chan--alleged to have masterminded the killing--have been widely reported since the killing and subsequent arrests.

“We do not talk about feelings,” said Cathryn Yee-Schwartz. “We need to talk about more than tests. . . . We need to raise balanced children.”

Attempting to provide answers, police officials said they recognized that a variety of problems plague youngsters in the community and vowed to work hard to curtail those troubles.

Principal George Giokaris admitted that drugs are present on his campus, but said it is difficult to determine how prevalent they are.

“I think it is difficult under the best of circumstances to raise a child in this American culture,” said Barry Naef, whose daughter, Amanda, is a 17-year-old senior at Sunny Hills. “I don’t think anyone has taken this news lightly.”

Students took their turns at the microphone, some still visibly shaken over the recent events.

“In the beginning, the people were shocked,” said 17-year-old Thomas Yi. “Now, we just don’t understand.”

The assembly began to break up after about two hours. But while the public venting of emotion seemed to ease the crowd on its way out, many of the questions remained unanswered.

“I think a lot of people were looking for solutions,” said Sophia Lee, 16. “What I got was a lot of negative feedback. We need everybody to get along.”