Teen Sentenced for Defacing Synagogue

The first of six juveniles arrested for painting anti-Semitic graffiti on a synagogue last month has been sentenced to perform 200 hours of community service.

The 16-year-old Los Angeles youth, who has been linked to the white-supremacist skinhead movement, was ordered by a Juvenile Court referee Thursday to perform community service and partially pay for the expenses of removing the graffiti from the walls of the Tifereth Israel Synagogue in the San Carlos area of the city.

Carlos Armour, the deputy district attorney who prosecuted the case, argued that the teen-ager showed no remorse for his actions and should be sent to a juvenile detention facility.

But Juvenile Court Referee Gilbert Smith released the youth to his father’s custody and allowed him to return to Los Angeles.

Police said the youth, whose name is being withheld because he is a juvenile, was with a group of youths who, after drinking a couple cases of beer, drove along Cowles Mountain Boulevard, spray-painting anti-Semitic messages and swastikas on the synagogue and two nearby homes.

Court hearings for the other five suspects are scheduled for late January.