Carjacker, 14, Admits Pushing Woman From Car

A 14-year-old Canoga Park boy pleaded guilty Tuesday to pushing a 73-year-old woman out of her car during a carjacking, breaking her hip, nose and elbow.

The 220-pound teen-ager pleaded guilty in Sylmar Juvenile Court to one count of robbery with a special allegation that he caused Esther Keely of Chatsworth great bodily injury.

The youth also pleaded guilty to one count of joy-riding based on a previous, unrelated incident, Deputy Dist. Atty. Joseph Musso said. He could be sentenced to a maximum of eight years and eight months in the California Youth Authority.

Los Angeles police arrested the teen-ager Feb. 10 for driving a car that was allegedly stolen by his brother during a carjacking in the parking lot of a Pic-N-Save on Sherman Way in Canoga Park, authorities said. Keely was injured in that same lot during a carjacking March 11.

Keely was sitting on the passenger side of her sister’s 1990 Mercury Sable, about to follow her two sisters who had gone shopping, when the teen-ager jumped into the driver’s seat, grabbed the car keys from beside the woman and drove off, police said. He then pushed her out the open passenger door.

Keely’s sister, Doris Payson, and a third sister, who asked that her name not be used, rushed to Keely’s side as she lay in a pool of blood.

Doctors later placed a pin in Keely’s hip and a plastic surgeon worked to repair her damaged nose, Payson said. “She won’t be able to walk alone for about two months,” she said.

The elderly woman has been under the care of nurses since the incident, Payson said.

Keely, who picked out her assailant from police mug shots, said she was relieved that authorities had arrested the young man in connection with the case, but the jail time he might face was too short.

“I don’t think it’s enough,” Keely said. “These kids get out and do it all over again.”

Police said the youth’s brother was suspected of stealing a car from the lot earlier. Detectives had asked the district attorney’s office to file charges against the 14-year-old youth in connection with the theft because he was found driving the car.

Charges were not filed against the boy at the time, however, because prosecutors were unable to confirm that the youth was actually the driver of the car at the time it was recovered, said Sandi Gibbons, spokeswoman for the district attorney’s office.

The youth was released because no charges were filed within 48 hours of his arrest. He was subsequently charged with joy-riding when police informed prosecutors that he was indeed driving the stolen car, Gibbons said.

Musso said the youth will be sentenced April 13.