Youth May Be Tried as Adult in Firebombings

A white supremacist who turned 18 in jail Sunday after being arrested in five racially motivated firebombings should be tried as an adult, a prosecutor said.

The suspect was taken into custody Saturday, the first arrest since the attacks began in July.

Police Chief Arturo Venegas said the teen-ager was “a believer in white supremacist movements,” but was “not being characterized as a skinhead.”

County Dist. Atty. Steve White said he would ask the Juvenile Court at a hearing Tuesday to have the teen-ager tried as an adult.

“If we prosecute him as a juvenile, the penalties he would receive would be minimal, a few years in juvenile hall,” White said. “As an adult, he could be sent to prison for life.”

White said the suspect’s name would be released only if the court agrees to try him as an adult. The identities of juvenile suspects are secret.

Venegas said police were continuing their investigation, but it was too early to say whether others were involved.

Those targeted in the attacks expressed relief that an arrest had been made.

Councilman Jimmie Yee, who escaped unharmed with his wife when their home was firebombed Oct. 5, said he was thankful he would no longer be “having that feeling you should always be looking over your shoulder.”

“We’re pleased someone is in custody,” said Clyde Rainwater, vice president of the local National Assn. for the Advancement of Colored People. “We just hope and pray that the justice system can be invoked and brought to some closure.”

The NAACP’s Sacramento office was firebombed July 27. On July 26, a firebomb was discovered burning outside a synagogue. On Oct. 14, a fire caused minor damage at a state office that handles discrimination claims. On Oct. 5, someone tossed a Molotov cocktail through Yee’s bedroom window, and the Japanese-American Citizens League office was heavily damaged by a firebomb Oct. 2.

After the latest fire, someone called a television station claiming responsibility on behalf of a white supremacist group called the Aryan Liberation Front.