Lawrence King murder trial – day two

Timothy Kincaid

July 6th, 2011

The testimony has begun and, frankly, I’m glad I’m not there. So far there have been several students who were but around 14 at the time and who remain horrified and shaken by the event. But while it must be difficult having to relive the events of three years ago, these are the witnesses. They were there when Brandon McInerney and his friends spent months tormenting Lawrence King; they were there when King finally fought back using flirting as his defense; and they were just feet from the two when McInerney put two bullets into the back of King’s head.

Today students testified about being present at the shootings and one boy spoke about hearing McInerney talk about plans to attack King. (LATimes)

Wearing a pullover sweater and a black plastic rosary around his neck, Cristian, 17, said he and McInerney had a physical education class together and that McInerney talked about King to a group of boys on the day before the February 2008 shooting.

“He said he was going to get some guys together and rush him and shank him,” Cristian said in court, adding that McInerney showed no emotion when he made the statement.

Cristian testified that he saw King occasionally wearing makeup, jewelry and high heels with his public school uniform. When that happened, some students would taunt him with homosexual slurs, Cristian said.

When asked by defense attorney Scott Wippert if he ever saw King “chasing boys around,” Cristian answered no.

Today also revealed a detail that is shocking and may suggest that the day ended with less tragedy than it might have. (Star)

The second witness this morning was retired Oxnard detective Joe Chase, an investigator in the case. He testified about the crime scene, including about finding the .22-caliber revolver used in the slaying.

The gun was cocked when police found it, meaning it was ready to fire a third shot. There were four live bullets remaining in the gun.

During cross-examination, Wippert asked Chase if it was possible that when the gun was dropped, it could have fallen on the hammer, cocking the weapon.

“Anything is possible, but I would say no,” he said. He later said the weapon was jammed and likely could not have fired a third shot.

MattNYC

July 6th, 2011

As we saw earlier this week, I just hope that the DA has a tight case.

Regan DuCasse

July 6th, 2011

This case is being tried in Chatsworth, and I would LOVE to be in the courtroom while this is going on. If there is a session Friday, I’m going to try and get in there. My favorite radio talk show pundits have observer reporters in the courtroom.
They are saying that the prosecution is having a hard time tying McInerny to a white supremacy group. And that such groups are notorious for their anti gay sentiment.
Yeah, well…so are all kinds of other people who claim to be Christians…or patriots. Like Lou Sheldon or Brian Camenker.
Grown assed people have been training their young to hate kids like Lawrence without them signing on to a specific white supremacy group.
This prosecutor should know better than that.
That it takes NOTHING for a gay kid or one thought to be to provoke violence.

Paul

July 7th, 2011

I’ve seen some of your articles say McInerney’s first name is Brandon, others (including the photo caption) say Brian. Which is it?

Timothy Kincaid

July 8th, 2011

Paul, his name is Brandon McInerney. The photo was incorrectly caption “Brian” and we did not notice the error when we reused the photo in more than one posting.

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