Pair Receive Prison Terms in Slaying of Clergyman

Two college students were sentenced Friday to 20 years and 12 years in prison for the killing of a minister in his Chatsworth home over a minor traffic accident.

The slaying of the black pastor by the two white men last year prompted accusations of racism against the district attorney’s office for its handling of the case.

In sentencing Dana L. Singer and Philip J. Dimenno, San Fernando Superior Court Judge Howard J. Schwab said the shooting was “beyond all comprehension.” Children of the pastor said they have forgiven the killers but had wished for stiffer sentences.

They also said, however, that harsher sentences would not lessen the sting of losing their father, Carl White, 54, pastor of Apostolic Temple Church in Pacoima.

“They have a father that loves them regardless of what happens,” said Stephen White, 41, the second-oldest of the pastor’s seven children, referring to the two defendants. “They have one thing I don’t have, and that’s a father. My children will never get to know their grandfather.”

The case triggered charges of racism after the Los Angeles County district attorney’s office initially recommended an unusually low bail of $20,000 for the defendants, who later admitted killing the minister. As a result, the district’s attorney’s office now requires all branch offices to obtain approval for bail recommendations of less than $250,000 in murder cases.

In a plea bargain worked out in July, Schwab sentenced Singer, 19, to 20 years to life in state prison for second-degree murder and credit card fraud. Dimenno, 20, was sentenced to 12 years in state prison for voluntary manslaughter and burglary.

Singer will be eligible for parole in 14 years and Dimenno in less than six years.

Dimenno will be allowed to begin serving his term in a California Youth Authority facility because of threats against him, according to Deputy Dist. Atty. Kenneth L. Barshop.

Last year, while waiting in a holding facility at the San Fernando courthouse, both men were attacked by a black prisoner. Dimenno’s attorney, Harold Greenberg, said Dimenno has been receiving threatening letters with racial overtones, including one that said black inmates would get Dimenno in prison.

Greenberg said Dimenno is interested in pursuing a college degree and that the CYA facility would offer his client better educational and counseling opportunities.

Prior to sentencing, another of White’s sons, Michael, 39, said in court that he forgives the pair for shooting his father. “I just hope and pray that this type of incident never happens again,” said Michael White, who is also a minister in Pacoima.

From the defendants’ table, Dimenno apologized to his family and the pastor’s. “This has destroyed many families,” he said, “and for that I’m sorry.”

Singer did not address the court, but his attorney, Gerald L. Chaleff, said his client was ashamed and sorry for committing a “senseless act.”

Outside the courtroom, White’s daughter, Deborah Gibson, 25, who broke down several times during the proceedings, said Singer “should have gotten the electric chair” and that Dimenno should have gotten life in prison.

Gibson and her brothers, however, said they accepted the plea bargain because a murder conviction in a jury trial might have been difficult, and the pair might have walked away without any prison time.

Dimenno and Singer originally were charged with first-degree murder and faced life in prison without parole. Barshop said he agreed to the plea bargain because the case relied primarily on the defendants’ statements.

The shooting occurred on July 28, 1990, after Dimenno and Singer went to White’s house in Chatsworth to try to persuade him not to report a traffic accident in which Dimenno had rear-ended the pastor’s car.

Dimenno, who had been accepted at UC Santa Barbara on a gymnastics scholarship, told police he had feared he would be arrested because of an outstanding traffic warrant and because his car was not insured.

The two were arrested three days after the killing when they tried to use one of White’s credit cards to buy tires and wheels. Singer, a business major at Cal State Northridge, later admitted shooting White once in the back of the head, according to court records.

After the district attorney’s office initially recommended the low bail for the two, the predominantly black Ministers Fellowship of the Greater San Fernando Valley accused prosecutors of “lethal racism,” charging that the bail would have been much higher if the victim had been white and the suspects black.

The low bail was revoked the day after it was granted, and the two defendants were held in the county’s Central Jail without bail.

Schwab summed up the shooting as “heinous, brutal and reflective of a moral void.”

“This case is a tragedy,” he said. “I can say no more.”