Murder Case Haunts Teens Never Charged

La Crescenta residents say that they want answers. After nine months of investigation, five teenagers have been identified as suspects in the bludgeoning murders of two boys on a school playground. So why is 16-year-old Michael Demirdjian the only one who has faced prosecution?

“Everybody always talks about it, ‘How come they haven’t arrested more people?’ ” said Frank Hoogenhuizen, who discovered the bodies in July as he was watering his lawn. “If it’s the Mafia, they know how to get away with crimes. But these are kids here. What is going on?”

The killings of Chris McCulloch, 13, and Blaine Talmo, 14, who were beaten beyond recognition, sent waves of shock and revulsion through a hillside community where violent crime is rare. Then another jolt came during Demirdjian’s recent trial, when prosecutors spoke in court about four suspects who have not been charged.

Now, a month later, no new arrests have been made, and prosecutors will not comment on why. The four teenagers have told police that they had nothing to do with the slayings. None of the four were called to the witness stand during Demirdjian’s trial.

“Damian Kim, Joseph Song, Marian Kim and Paul Kim . . . are suspects in this double homicide,” Deputy Dist. Attys. Steve Barshop and Truc Do wrote in a March motion in the Demirdjian prosecution, which ended last month in a hung jury. Song is 19 and the three Kims, who are not related, are 18. Prosecutors intend to retry Demirdjian in June.

At Crescenta Valley High School, where two suspects are still enrolled, classmates said they felt rattled by the mistrial and the prospect that more suspects may be at large.

“It’s kind of scary,” said Brooke Hines, 15.

School Weighs Removing Students

School administrators said last week that they were unaware that Marian Kim and Damian Kim, both seniors, were identified as suspects. They later examined the court file and said they plan to meet with the two students and their parents today, possibly to remove them from the campus.

“We’ve alerted the district and as we speak we’re looking into the situation,” said Co-Principal Gary Talbert.

Damian Kim said the association of his name with the slayings has been hard on him and his family.

“I go to school and people say bad things about me. Even teachers are looking at me the wrong way,” he said as his father and mother listened in their La Crescenta home. “I had nothing to do with the murders.”

Kim said that Glendale police, who conducted the investigation, arrested him last year, but he was released without being charged.

When asked about testimony that a police dog connected him to the murder scene, Kim added: “It’s all not true because I was never there.”

Paul Kim, a freshman at UC Irvine, said he wasn’t arrested. The police questioned him, and he said he voluntarily provided DNA samples.

“About the murder, I know nothing.”

Paul Kim and Damian Kim said they would have been willing to testify at the Demirdjian trial if they had been called as witnesses.

Many in the middle-class community said they have been agonizing over the case.

“I personally feel there may be a killer or more walking the streets,” said Danette Erickson, a member of the Crescenta Valley Town Council.

The prosecution case was based on the charge that before the murders, 19-year-old Adam Walker took $660 from Demirdjian for a marijuana deal but failed to produce the drugs. Part of the money belonged to Damian Kim, and the deal came about after Talmo introduced Demirdjian to Walker, prosecutors said.

Prosecutors alleged that the victims were robbed and killed in what began as an attempt to get Walker.

In a police interview in July, Damian Kim admitted contributing $160 to the drug deal, but said that Walker returned his money before the slayings, according to court documents. Joseph Song, Marian Kim and Paul Kim all told police that when they learned of the drug rip-off, they helped Damian Kim chase Walker to get his money back, and they were en route to Palm Springs at the time of the slayings, the documents said.

Demirdjian testified that he stood by, stoned and drunk, as Walker began arguing with McCulloch. The defendant alleged that Walker first knocked McCulloch down with a rock, and when Talmo intervened, Walker killed him with a rock.

Prosecutors said Walker is not a suspect. They argued that Demirdjian’s story is implausible, in part because the police believed more than one person must have participated in the extreme violence to overcome the two victims.

The prosecution presented testimony that a police dog detected Damian Kim’s scent on the bloody 16-pound rock found next to Talmo’s head and Joseph Song’s scent on the bench found crushing McCulloch’s chest.

In the end, eight jurors voted to convict Demirdjian of the slayings, and four favored acquittal.

Prosecutors would not say why they disclosed the suspects’ names and the purported evidence against them without bringing charges. But Laurie Levenson, a professor at Loyola Law School and a former prosecutor, said, “It sounds to me they don’t have enough evidence. . . . Maybe they felt they had to . . . show the scope of their investigation.”

Demirdjian’s attorney, Charles T. Mathews, called the prosecution’s case “hocus-pocus and baloney.”

Joseph Song declined to comment. Marian Kim could not be reached.