Slain Youth’s Family Given Diploma : Tragedy: Tony Petrossian, stabbed to death while protecting friends during a brawl, was a senior at Hoover High.

Just a few months before his graduation from Hoover High School, Tony Petrossian described how important it was for him to overcome his difficulties at school and earn his diploma.

“I have worked too hard, put a lot of time and effort into my education for me to totally throw everything away now,” the teen-ager wrote in an essay for his creative writing class. “I have to tough it out until I am out of high school and into the real world.”

Tony, a popular, athletic 17-year-old senior, was stabbed to death May 29, when he intervened in a fight between two teens over a broken $50 car stereo. On Thursday, school district officials presented the youth’s diploma to his parents in a private ceremony.

“We know how important it was for him to get this,” said school board President Jeanne Bentley during the brief, emotional presentation at the family’s apartment. Tony’s mother, Julia Petrossian, clutched the diploma to her chest and sobbed.

Although Tony disliked high school and devoted much of his time to bodybuilding and sports, family members said his tough exterior belied his intelligence and a sensitive, creative side to his personality that had begun to emerge in recent years. The youth had filled several notebooks with poetry and essays dealing with family relationships and even his own mortality, said his father, Alec Petrossian.

“Although he was very athletic and strong, he was also very gentle,” Petrossian said. “He was planning to go to [Los Angeles] Valley College and to become a sheriff’s deputy, like his oldest brother.”

Based on statements from suspects and witnesses, police said that Tony was not involved in the dispute but was slain while trying to protect his friends.

The dispute began in early May when Armen Davoodian, 18, a friend of Tony’s and also a Hoover High senior, sold a stereo amplifier to another student, police said. Over the next few weeks, threats were exchanged after the buyer refused to pay for the stereo because he said it was broken. Police said the argument eventually erupted into a brawl involving up to 20 teens gathered at Brand Park.

The four suspects in the stabbing death are scheduled to be arraigned on murder charges in a Pasadena courtroom Tuesday. Three of the four suspects also are Hoover High seniors, but state law prohibited them from finishing the school year. Davoodian, who was wounded in the brawl and is not charged with a crime, was allowed to finish his studies at home.

Glendale school officials said the ceremony Thursday marked the first time a Hoover student had been awarded a diploma posthumously. However, in 1991, the family of a Crescenta Valley High School student who was shot to death by a classmate after the senior prom was presented with her diploma during the school’s commencement.

“Given the circumstances, we felt it was the only right thing to do,” said Hoover Principal Theresa Saunders. “Right from the beginning, there was never a question in my mind that he had earned his diploma and it should go to the family.”