14-Year-Old Is Convicted in Slaying of Friend, 9

A 14-year-old boy, on trial as a juvenile, has been found guilty of second-degree murder after he shot and killed a 9-year-old friend in a Glendale apartment over the summer.

The verdict was announced Wednesday in Pasadena Juvenile Court, where prosecution and defense attorneys wrangled during a three-day trial over what was considered the main issue: whether the teen-ager acted with implied malice.

“Basically, for second-degree murder, you commit the act intentionally, knowing the danger with a subjective awareness of the risk,” Deputy Dist. Atty. Laura Foland-Priver said. “I felt from the beginning it was a second-degree murder. That was always our theory, and that’s exactly what we wanted.”

The teen-ager, whose identity is being withheld because of his age, is scheduled to be sentenced May 3 and faces a maximum of 11 years at the California Youth Authority.

He and the victim, Sang Lee, lived in the same apartment complex in the 1200 block of Virginia Avenue. By most accounts, they were close friends who often enjoyed playing together.

The teen-ager told police that he invited Lee to his apartment to watch television around noon Aug. 12.

Soon after they finished, the older boy went to a living room cabinet and pulled out his father’s .38-caliber revolver from a shoe box, intending to scare the boy with it.

The teen-ager loaded the gun with one bullet and pulled the trigger twice--hitting the fourth-grader in the chest on the second try. He told police that he unloaded the gun immediately after the shooting, returned it to the cabinet and dialed 911.

Lee died less than an hour later at Glendale Adventist Medical Center.

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Deputy Public Defender Enrique Marinez declined to comment. Commissioner Karen J. Nudell, who ruled in the case, was unavailable for comment Thursday.

But Foland-Priver said Nudell based her verdict on many things.

“She listed several of the minor’s actions, which she felt were important in deciding a second-degree,” the deputy district attorney said. “She felt the fact he was doing it to scare the victim was important. The fact that he unloaded the gun and returned it to the cabinet was significant.

“A combination of all the facts, each of his actions, his reason to do it, she considered important in reaching second-degree murder.”