Mother Seeks Mercy for Convicted Teens

As the mother of two adolescent boys, Sharry Holland always worried. Mostly about small stuff, though. Like maybe they would get in the wrong car or go to the wrong party or sass somebody they shouldn’t.

She knew trouble can easily come calling for teenagers, enticing them into potentially dangerous situations.

“It’s such a thin line they walk,” said Holland, of Westlake Village. “It’s like they’re trying to stay on the balance beam of life throughout adolescence.”

On May 22, 1995, her two sons--Jason, now 19, and Micah, now 16--fell off that balance beam in a way Holland never anticipated. Along with two other Conejo Valley teenagers, the Holland brothers got into a backyard brawl in Agoura Hills with two acquaintances. It wasn’t about much more than boyhood bravado--and a few bags of marijuana--but it ended up with disastrous results.

A 16-year-old boy named Jimmy Farris, the popular son of a Los Angeles police officer, was left dead, stabbed twice. The friend Farris was defending in the fight, Mike McLoren, who was also the owner of the pot, was badly injured, bleeding from three stab wounds.

Six weeks ago, Jason and Micah Holland, Brandon Hein, 19, of Oak Park and Tony Miliotti, 18, of Westlake Village were convicted of Farris’ murder by a Malibu jury. The jury also found a special circumstance--that the murder happened during a robbery, which means the four teenagers face possible life terms in prison without parole. Their sentencing is scheduled for today, although their attorneys have asked Judge Lawrence J. Mira for a delay.

Sharry Holland knows Mira’s hands are basically tied, although Micah Holland and Miliotti were juveniles at the time of the murder and could be given lighter sentences. She is holding out hope that Mira will not send all four to prison for life.

“I’d ask him to search his heart,” she said. “I don’t see how anybody could think that life in prison for any of them is fair.”

During the trial, Jason Holland testified that it was he who stabbed Farris. He told the jury that he and the other boys were drunk and that he was trying to defend his younger brother, whom he said McLoren had in a headlock. He never intended to kill Farris, he said.

Police and the district attorney’s office believe the four convicted teenagers were linked to a suburban wannabe gang called the Gumbys and suggested that the deadly fight was motivated by a desire to enhance the gang’s reputation. But the defense repeatedly denied the connection and Mira allowed only minimal testimony about the issue during the trial.

Sharry Holland said that by testifying, her son Jason wanted to take responsibility for his actions. She said he’s ready to accept whatever punishment the judge hands out. But she said he still can’t bear the fact that his brother and his friends will also be punished for what he did.

“He thinks that it is pretty much, ‘I know my life is over,’ but that it shouldn’t be for the other boys,” she said.

Based on Jason’s testimony, defense attorney Ira Salzman said he expects him to receive a voluntary or involuntary manslaughter conviction. Sending all four teenagers to prison for life is too harsh, he said.

“We want to reserve one of the more onerous punishments we have for cold-blooded intentional murderers,” Salzman said. “Even the prosecutors can’t say with a straight face that there was intent to kill here.”

Salzman said he felt that prosecutors were particularly tough on these defendants because of the suburban setting of the crime.

“This is the kind of case that happens in downtown Los Angeles or Compton every day,” he said. “But because it happened in Agoura, that makes it somehow some major moral crusade.”

Prosecutor Mike Latin said the suburban setting may have made a difference in the amount of publicity the case received, but he scoffed at the defense contention that it heightened prosecutorial zeal. “I think that is ridiculous,” he said.

Sharry Holland said she wishes she could reach out to the Farris family. But she fears the reaction she would get.

“I wish the lines had never been drawn in the sand,” she said. “We should all embrace each other, stand together and understand that this could so easily happen to anybody. What is it that we have to do as a community to help our teenagers?”

Every Sunday, she leaves her home at 6 a.m. for visiting hours at the Los Angeles County Jail. It’s competitive; only 36 prisoners are brought down from isolation for visits starting at 10 a.m., so she has to get there early. By noon, she’s usually sitting across from her eldest child, separated by a sheet of acrylic plastic. They talk on the phone for 20 minutes. They can’t touch.

“I really miss that with Jason,” she said. She put her hand up flat against an imaginary window. “We go like this instead.”

Holland stops herself, thinking of another mother who misses her son. “I know in my heart that Judie Farris must say, ‘At least you can talk to him; at least you can talk to your son,’ ” she said.

But watching the effect on both her sons after a year in jail, with nothing else in sight, is still hard on her, Holland said.

“I’ve noticed the boys are getting in the habit of not looking in my eyes,” she said. “I have to tell Jason, ‘Look at me. I want to see your eyes.’ They are so isolated. He doesn’t even realize he isn’t looking at me.”

When she leaves Jason on Sundays, she drives to see Micah, housed separately in a juvenile facility. “I can hug him,” she said. “We sit across from each other and I can lean over the table.”

For Holland, there is no walking away from her sons, no matter what they’ve done. If they are sentenced to life in prison, she said she will spend the rest of her life appealing the case if necessary. She would never downplay the worth of Jimmy Farris’ life, she said. But she plans to fight for her own children’s lives.

“How many years do you have to spend repenting for a life you have taken inadvertently?” she said. “I don’t know. But I think the rest of your life, when you are 19 and there isn’t even a chance to get out, it’s cruel.”