Teacher Accused of Murder Refuses Plea Bargain Offer

A former popular North Hollywood middle school teacher charged in a 1994 beating death refused a plea bargain Wednesday, while five co-defendants pleaded no contest to voluntary manslaughter rather than face life in prison if convicted of murder.

Denneth Thaddeus Jackson, 27, and six other defendants were charged with avenging a traffic accident by fatally beating a suspected drunk driver outside Jackson’s apartment in Reseda on Nov. 12, 1994.

Jackson, in a brief appearance in Superior Court on Wednesday, declined to accept a prosecution offer that called for him to spend 11 years in state prison for the death of Julio Aguilar, 23.

Authorities said Jackson and co-defendant Richard Lee Baker, who also declined the prosecution offer, continue to face charges of murder, attempted murder and assault with a deadly weapon.

Authorities said Aguilar and his brother, Jose, then 21, were attacked outside Jackson’s Amigo Avenue apartment, where a party was being held, and pummeled with pool cues, chunks of wood, fists and feet.

Officials said the Aguilar brothers were outside the apartment a couple of hours after Julio Aguilar--allegedly intoxicated--crashed into a parked pickup truck that belonged to someone attending the party. Julio Aguilar was arrested after the accident, but was bailed out of jail and returned to the scene with his brother to check the truck’s damage, officials said.

Following his arrest, stunned school officials said Jackson, a social studies teacher at Madison Middle School, was a role model for many students. But the party at Jackson’s apartment was attended by many gang members and teenagers who were drinking alcohol and smoking marijuana, Los Angeles police said.

Besides Jackson and Baker, the defendants, all in their late teens or early twenties, were: Marvin Lewis Foster, Oswaldo Ramos Perez, William Ronald Davis, Jose Luis Macias and Manuel Ramos.

Officials said the defendants who accepted the plea bargain face 11 years in state prison. Judge Michael R. Hoff scheduled sentencing on Feb. 7 for Foster, Perez, Macias and Ramos. Davis will be sentenced Feb. 22.

“We believe these dispositions were appropriate,” said Deputy Dist. Atty. Lea Purwin D’Agostino, who is prosecuting the case. “I cannot comment any further since the case is still pending against two defendants.”