Teenager Killed Woman, 82, Judge Rules

As his mother wept quietly in a nearly empty courtroom, a 15-year-old boy was found responsible Friday for two 1996 shooting deaths, including the highly publicized murder of Watts grandmother Viola McClain.

His head bowed, the teenager sat motionless as Juvenile Court Judge Cecil Mills ruled that the boy had shot and killed McClain on the front porch of the 111th Street home where she had lived for more than half a century. Mills also ruled that the boy shot at McClain’s grandson, who escaped being hit by the gunfire that killed the 82-year-old woman.

Mills also ruled that the 15-year-old shot and killed Patrick Birdsong, 24, inside the Nickerson Gardens housing project two weeks before the mayhem on 111th Street. That shooting, prosecutors had charged, involved the same 9-millimeter semiautomatic used to kill McClain and--like her death--occurred as the youth was aiming at someone else.

At a disposition hearing Sept. 5, the youth faces no more than 10 years in the California Youth Authority because, by law, he must be released by age 25.

Mills’ decision came two days after he ruled that authorities had failed to prove that the teenager’s 13-year-old co-defendant was responsible for McClain’s murder. That youth remains in custody and awaits sentencing for his role in the gang rape of a young girl--a crime that preceded by only hours the slaying of McClain. Five other youths were also convicted of the rape.

None of the juveniles have been identified in The Times because they were tried as minors.

Mills’ ruling capped an emotional week in which a tragic series of events in July 1996 was recalled--sometimes in painful detail--in a small Downey courtroom.

From the start, Deputy Dist. Atty. Eleanor Hunter had argued that McClain’s July 26, 1996, murder was the final senseless act in an afternoon of coldblooded violence.

The crimes, authorities maintain, began with the gang rape of a 13-year-old girl at an abandoned duplex next to McClain’s bungalow. After the assault, it was charged, several of the youths attempted to burn down the duplex and were confronted by McClain’s grandson, Dumar Starks. When the 34-year-old Starks saw one youth pull out a gun, he turned and ran toward his house for a weapon, avoiding the bullet that took his grandmother’s life.

Although theorizing that the 13-year-old, then 11, first shot at Starks, authorities maintained that it was the older youth who fired the fatal bullet.

In her closing arguments, Hunter suggested that there was more than sufficient proof that the 15-year-old killed McClain after shooting at her grandson.

During testimony, Hunter said, the grandson identified the 15-year-old as the one who threatened him with a handgun, and another neighbor identified the teenager as the one who opened fire.

In addition, Hunter said, two other witnesses claimed to have overheard a conversation between the youth and another teenager in which he nervously described the shooting.

And, she added, it was the youth’s own interview with police that linked him to Birdsong’s slaying because he not only knew details of the killing but told detectives that the same gun was used in both shootings.

Noting that the Birdsong murder, 10 days before McClain’s, had not received widespread notoriety, Hunter said only someone involved in the slaying could know so much about it.

The teenager’s attorney, Kenneth Aid, countered that the youth’s links to both murders were tenuous.

The grandson, Aid noted, may have seen the youth with a gun but had turned toward his own house when a gunshot rang out and did not see if that youth or another had fired. Another key witness, the neighbor, not only was standing some 200 feet away but originally identified the 13-year-old as the shooter, Aid said.

“We do not know who shot the shot that killed Mrs. McClain,” Aid insisted. “That is purely speculation.”