4 teens agree to plead guilty in fatal 2023 beating of Las Vegas high schooler

MicroWave@lemmy.world to News@lemmy.world – 174 points – 4 teens agree to plead guilty in fatal 2023 beating of Las Vegas high schooler
nbcnews.com

Jonathan Lewis Jr., 17, was badly injured in the Nov. 1 attack near Rancho High School in Las Vegas. He died less than a week later.

Four teenagers accused of fatally beating a classmate last year in Las Vegas have agreed to plead guilty to voluntary manslaughter, which will keep them from being tried as adults, attorneys confirmed Thursday.

Nine students were arrested in connection with the melee on Nov. 1 involving a large group of people near Rancho High School, in which 17-year-old Jonathan Lewis was critically injured; he later died.

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The plea represents a civil conviction, which will be expunged from the defendants’ records when they turn 21,

3 years for beating someone to death and coming out with a clean record is insane. The article quotes the mother as saying she was told the teens were pleading guilty to murder. This prosecutor is a real piece of shit.

According to the boys father he was killed for defending his friend who was being bullied. The brawl involved a stolen pair of headphones and vape pen.

Jfc my gut tells me to ask wtf is wrong with kids these days but I know this kind of thing has been going on for generations.

My teacher in middle school had a friend in the 80s that was killed trying to break up a fight at a party.

To that point people covered things up more "back in the day"

Group of athletes murder someone at school for being gay? Can't have the local sports team lose the season, let's just sweep that under the rug and say a drifter did it!

I'd say only thing that changed is it's harder to hide or excuse these situations.

Humans have killed each other since before humans evolved.

The difference is we live in a society

The only thing "society" does is decide who is allowed to do the killing. Government instead of individual.

I gotta say I never understood the whole not trying them as adults thing.

I get that kids brains aren't fully developed and that can lead them to do some morally apprehensive things but that just sounds like a bullshit excuse. That's an excuse meant to be used for shit like stealing a candy bar or mild vandalism not beating someone to death.

Honestly I think the parents of the child should also end up with legal ramifications. You raised a piece of shit now you get to deal with the consequences.

Every kid who commits adult crimes should be charged as an adult.

What about the case of a 10yo killing its abusive neo nazi father? Does the child fully understand the consequences of what it did, or did it just want the abuse to stop?

That child got as many years jailtime as it was old at the time of the killing.

Sources: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-nation/wp/2016/08/26/i-shot-dad-the-tragic-case-of-a-child-who-killed-his-abusive-neo-nazi-father/

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/10-year-old-boy-who-killed-neo-nazi-father-denied-supreme-court-review/

I think we can all agree that killing Nazis is never a crime.

Also, if he was being abused, that’s self defense. What he needed was a better lawyer.

Without clarification on what you mean by "adult crimes", this is basically just saying "eliminate the juvenile justice system and feed the children to the sharks".

Felonies. Let’s just use that as the line.

You fundamentally don't understand the purpose of the juvenile justice system, you're just interested in the most punitive system possible. That is the system we already have, and we're one of the worst in world at it. There's no good argument for making the system even worse by cracking down on children specifically.

No, I understand it. I just don’t agree with you.

Kids who kill on purpose, and not in self defense, deserve to be treated like any other human.

Additionally, the parents should share in a good portion of then penalty.

Obviously each case has its own circumstances, so we shouldn’t throw the book at every one.

The kids in question were very much aware of what is right and wrong.

You want your cake and to eat it too.

Either a 17 year old is old enough to control themselves and skills be tried as an adult, in which case they’re ills enough to be responsible for their actions. Or, a 17 is too immature, and their parent’s are responsible for their behavior.

There were 9 students involved and 4 pleaded guilty.

I think we can establish a link between undeveloped brains and mob mentality.

That is a cruel and stupid thing to say

They were 17. If they were 18 they would be tried as adults.

Do you know what's cruel? Beating a classmate to death.

Two month later and they would've suddenly realised that killing is not okey dokey.

If they're going to be innocent legally within 3 years, they should receive a little punishment they can't take off.

The fight erupted over stolen headphones and possibly a stolen marijuana vape pen, police had said.

Lock those kids up for 15-20