Informer’s Death Not Just ‘Business’

* Re “3 Will Stand Trial in Informant’s Slaying” (Sept. 10).

I am appalled. I am disgusted. But I am not surprised. Attorneys who defend murderous gang members have no conscience or decency. So how can anyone be surprised at the statements made by Forrest Latiner, attorney for one of the gang members, who have admitted to torturing and strangling Chad MacDonald and raping and shooting his girlfriend. She did not die. So they can’t deny. (Pardon the Cochranism.)

Latiner is quoted as saying “We all agree that this was a homicide that occurred . . . to teach this guy that you don’t go dropping names or pull a dime on somebody. Our view is that MacDonald was not killed as a result of commission of robbery, kidnap or rape. Basically, there was a feeling, a sense that he was a snitch or working for the police. I don’t think anyone really meant to kill.”

Oh, I see. This was nothing personal. Sort of a force majeure event in the normal course of doing gang business. I guess these kind of things happen when you brutalize and murder people for a living. Pardon me for being so ignorant in thinking that a 17-year-old boy was tortured to death and his 17-year-old girlfriend was raped, shot in the face and left for dead because the admitted perpetrators are habitual sociopathic criminals.

By the way, “pull a dime on somebody” does not sound lawyerly.

MIKE MARELLO

Irvine