Halloween Murders Jury Deadlocked

A Los Angeles Superior Court jury Friday declared that it was hopelessly deadlocked on whether to recommend death sentences or life in prison for three men convicted in the 1993 Halloween murders of three Pasadena boys.

The eight women and four men said that after six days of deliberations and straw polls they could not agree on the punishment for Lorenzo Alex Newborn, 25, Karl Holmes, 20, and Herbert Charles McClain Jr., 26, generating a mistrial in the penalty phase of the case.

In December, the same jury found the defendants guilty of killing Edgar Evans, 13, and Stephen Coats and Reggie Crawford, both 14, and wounding three other boys while the group trick-or-treated their way home from a birthday party.

McClain was also found guilty of the attempted murder of another man just days before the murders.

“I’m as satisfied as I can be,” said McClain’s attorney, H. Elizabeth Harris, after the jury announced its decision.

Jurors told Judge J.D. Smith that in the most recent of a series of votes, they deadlocked 9 to 3 in favor of death for Newborn and 10 to 2 supporting death for McClain and Holmes.

Prosecutors said the choice between imposing death or life in prison can be difficult even for jurors who support the death penalty. The lopsided support for death for all three, prosecutors said, is proof that most of the jurors were convinced of the horrifying nature of the crimes.

“The interplay between justice and compassion is [difficult] and an individual needs to come to terms with that,” said Deputy Dist. Atty. Antony Myers. “Life without possibility of parole is a severe sentence.”

Jurors refused to comment on their verdicts.

The district attorney’s office will announce March 1 whether they will retry the penalty phase of the case with a new jury--a move that could force prosecutors to put on much of their case from the guilt phase again, so that jurors could appreciate the horror of the crime.

Prosecutors also said that Solomon Bowen, one of two other defendants accused in the case and set to be tried separately, pleaded guilty this week to one count each of assault with a deadly weapon and firing at an inhabited dwelling.

In the agreement, Bowen will receive a 12-year suspended sentence and probation. By pleading to two felonies, prosecutors said, Bowen also sets himself up to go to prison for life under the “three strikes law” if he is convicted of another felony.

A trial for the last defendant, Aurelius Bailey, is scheduled to start next week.

During the penalty phase, prosecutors argued for retribution, while defense attorneys asked for mercy.

“They say an eye for an eye,” Myers told the jury, urging them to consider the brutality and randomness of the crime, in which the defendants allegedly mistook the children for rival gang members. “They don’t have enough eyes to make it fair.”

Prosecutors argued that the defendants also have a history of antisocial, often illegal, behavior.

The defense argued that those acts do not elevate their clients to the level of the “worst of the worst,” and therefore deserving of death.

“We are asking you not to snuff out anybody, not to retaliate, not to seek revenge and not to treat this as a game,” said Newborn’s attorney, Carl Jones. “This is serious, serious, business.”