2 High School Athletes Arrested After Beating Death

Two high school football players were being held on suspicion of murder Tuesday after a man they allegedly beat up at a party near Palmdale died of extensive head injuries.

Littlerock High School students Marcus Raines and Richard Newton, both 17, attacked the man during a Friday night party, punching him and kicking him several times in the head, the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department said.

The victim, Christopher O’Leary, 19, went home after the fight and fell asleep. He was airlifted to a hospital hours later in critical condition. On Saturday, Raines, a top linebacker and track high hurdler, went to a track meet and won two medals.

On Monday, O’Leary died at the hospital.

Deputies arrested Newton and Raines on Monday and both remain in custody. Both have good grades and no history of disciplinary problems, said Michael Dutton, principal of Littlerock High.

“They were athletic stars with very bright futures,” Dutton said.

Friends said O’Leary had a bright future too.

“He seemed very sweet and funny and he had this creative edge about him,” said Christina Wilson, 18, who had known O’Leary since he was a high school freshman.

Some witnesses say the fight started over a racial slur when O’Leary, who was white, used a racial epithet to refer to Raines and Newton, who are black. Authorities say the attack appeared to be unprovoked.

If it was racially motivated, it would be the second death in six months reported in such circumstances in Antelope Valley. In November, Stephan Corson, a 13-year-old black boy, was killed in a schoolyard scrap with a white student and Corson’s family has claimed that the fight was provoked by a racial slur.

Sheriff’s Lt. Don Bear said the latest incident is still being investigated and the district attorney’s office has not yet been presented the case. If the youths are charged with murder, however, a new state law may require them to be tried as adults.

The incident started at a party Friday night in Littlerock, an unincorporated area east of Palmdale. According to Bear, O’Leary was talking with his girlfriend, a Littlerock High cheerleader, in front of a house on Boxthorn Street where several dozen students had gathered for a party.

Around midnight, O’Leary tried to persuade his girlfriend to leave but apparently the two football players encouraged her to stay, said Dennis Henson, 18, who was at the party.

O’Leary, who attended Littlerock High until last year, did not know Raines or Newton, police said.

While he was arguing with his girlfriend, who has not been identified, O’Leary referred to the football players in a racist way, Henson said.

Bear, however, said that preliminary statements from witnesses appear to show the fight was unprovoked.

Both Raines and Newton are athletes. Raines is a 6-foot-2, 195-pound All-Golden League linebacker and a track star ranked No. 2 in the state in the high hurdles. A junior, he is a major-college football prospect. Newton, also a junior, is Littlerock High’s starting quarterback.

Newton felled O’Leary with a punch to the face, and then Raines kicked him several times in the head, students alleged.

O’Leary had few visible injuries and after the fight, his friends helped him up and drove him, dazed, to his home in Littlerock, where he lived with his parents, police said. He went to bed, and a few hours later, when his girlfriend came to the house to check on him, he was not moving.

O’Leary was airlifted to Northridge Hospital Medical Center about 4 a.m. Saturday. Nurses learned of what had happened and notified sheriff’s investigators.

In the meantime, Raines traveled with the Littlerock track team Saturday morning to Norwalk for the CIF-Southern Section Division I track finals, where he won the 110-meter high hurdles and the 300-meter intermediate hurdles.

Risling is a Times Community News reporter and Gettleman is a Times staff writer.