2 Teens Charged With Boy’s Murder

Prosecutors filed murder charges Friday against boys, ages 16 and 17, who allegedly admitted beating 12-year-old Rodney Haynes to death just days after he’d moved into a group home for troubled teens in Calabasas.

The starkly cruel killing, which authorities said involved blows with a stick and large rock, raised questions about whether the Los Angeles County Probation Department’s placement of Haynes with the older offenders was appropriate.

Whatever happened after the three sneaked out of Passageway, a six-bed group home, the victim clearly would have been mismatched against his suspected attackers.

Haynes, who was slain two miles from the home, was small for his age--4 feet 10 and barely 85 pounds, more child than teenager, a guardian said. The older of his alleged assailants weighed about 200 pounds, a detective said.

The only reason the two gave for the killing, according to police: He was a “wise guy,” and they didn’t like him.

“Let’s just say they did not appear to be remorseful,” said Sgt. John Greenwood, a homicide investigator with the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department.

As state and county officials announced investigations, one of Haynes’ guardians criticized his placement at Passageway.

“A 12-year-old has no business being with a 17-year-old,” said Linda Smith, speaking over the telephone from her home in Compton. “I don’t understand why they put him out there with those boys. Was there any supervision there? I can’t swallow this.”

The home’s founder, Andrew Juels, did not return phone calls.

The group home is tucked against a driving range in the affluent western San Fernando Valley bedroom community, where some residents reacted with fear and planned a meeting Tuesday at a nearby park.

“Our children are sleeping at our feet right now, and we have our windows and doors locked,” said schoolteacher Robert Zazula, who lives in the Saratoga Hill neighborhood near the slaying scene. “It’s a beautiful community here, but everything changed two nights ago.”

Joe Estrada, director of placement services for the Los Angeles County Probation Department, said state guidelines on placement of juveniles focus on the severity of the offense and needs of the offender, rather than on age. The agency contracted with Passageway for its services and placed Haynes in the home.

“The state licenses the facilities with the ages anywhere from 12 to 17, or 13 to 18,” he said. “We match the needs of the kid with the placement resources.”

County probation officials said they will investigate to determine whether the department’s policies and procedures were followed adequately, said acting Chief Probation Officer Walter Kelly.

The California Department of Social Services began an inquiry into the death Friday.

“We have somebody at the facility as we speak,” Director Corinne Chee said.

Chee said the probe will focus on health and safety concerns, whether Passageway had adequate staffing, whether there was proper supervision, and what the teens did when they left overnight.

“These are kids with major behavioral problems,” she said. “These owners are being paid a significant amount of money to properly supervise and monitor them and make sure they are safe.”

Meanwhile, records of state licensing inspections of Passageway’s five group homes dating to 1990 show management was cited for numerous violations--including a failure to notify licensing officials of clients who left without permission or were booked by police. It was not clear from the records how many of the incidents, if any, involved the group home in Calabasas.

Other citations included failing to report suspected physical or psychological abuse and failure to provide proper supervision and protection of clients.

Haynes’ role in a video store robbery brought him into contact with the juvenile justice system.

Physically small and described by one criminal justice source as “a tiny, cute kid,” Haynes won the hearts of nearly everyone he came into contact with at the Los Padrinos juvenile facility.

“The system did everything it could for him,” said one knowledgeable source, who asked not to be identified.

Smith disagreed.

“I thought they’d send him to school, not send him to lose his life,” Smith said. “It was was like just putting him out on the street.”

The teens each have been charged with a single count of murder, said Sandi Gibbons, a spokeswoman for the Los Angeles County district attorney’s office. Their first juvenile court appearance is scheduled for Tuesday, and prosecutors are likely to request that they face trial as adults in Superior Court.

The two boys said they decided to sneak out of the home about 10:30 p.m. Wednesday to hang out at the strip mall in the 26500 block of Agoura Road, said Greenwood of the Sheriff’s Department. Haynes tagged along.

He had been at the home only six days and had been involved in several arguments with his alleged assailants, Greenwood said.

“There had been kid-type things--pushing, exchanges of words,” Greenwood added. “What 12-year-old isn’t a wise guy?”

The boys walked out the front door, asking another youth to lock it behind them.

At the strip mall, the boys told investigators, Haynes made a wisecrack--sparking the fatal beating at about 11 p.m.

“You have to remember what kind of kids we are dealing with--problem kids,” said Bill Looney, the other investigator. “Another kid would have handled it a little different.”

Greenwood said the two teens returned to the home, sneaking back in through the garage. Early the following morning the staff notified Lost Hills station deputies that Haynes was missing.

Haynes’ body was found about 9:30 a.m. when a sanitation worker unloaded a dumpster into a garbage truck and saw blood on the container as he set it back on the ground, Greenwood said. A few moments later, he looked in his truck and saw the boy’s body.

Scent dogs led police to Passageway, where Greenwood and Looney interviewed the boys housed there, who initially claimed they knew nothing.

Sometime later, however, a staffer at the home paged the investigators, saying the boys “had not been truthful.”

When they returned, Greenwood said he and Looney found bloody shoes and clothing belonging to the two teens. They were booked at the Lost Hills station about 5 a.m. Thursday.

“They made some very detailed statements and each implicated themselves--not the other,” Greenwood said.

He said the teens had no reaction to their arrest or the killing.

An examination revealed Haynes died of blunt trauma to the head, said Scott Carrier, a spokesman for the Los Angeles County coroner’s office. Coroner’s officials said they were less certain than the homicide investigators about what caused the fatal injuries.

“We can’t conclusively say it was caused by a rock,” Carrier said. “What may have been used? We are uncertain at this time.”

Carrier said Haynes also suffered cuts and bruises around his head, but they were not life-threatening. An exact time of death could not be determined.

The home where the boys lived appeared to be well-run, according to Greenwood.

“I thought the home was very well-managed,” he said. “The boys seemed to like the staff, and the staff treated the boys very well.

“Both of us feel this was a very good home,” Greenwood said. “I don’t know what could have been done to prevent this.”