2 White Youths on Trial in Killing of a Mexican
POTTSVILLE, Pa. — Ethnicity was at the center of opening arguments here Monday in the trial of two white teenagers charged in the fatal beating of an illegal immigrant from Mexico last July.
Lawyers for the two defendants described the death of the 25-year-old victim, Luis Ramírez, as a result of nothing more than a street fight gone bad in the nearby community of Shenandoah, some 80 miles northwest of Philadelphia. They denied that Mr. Ramírez had been killed because he was Mexican or in the United States illegally.
But the lead prosecutor, Robert P. Frantz, assistant Schuylkill County district attorney, told jurors that there was a reason the case had drawn close attention in the heated national debate over immigration.
“They called Mr. Ramírez a spic,” Mr. Frantz said of the defendants, Brandon Piekarski, 17, and Derrick Donchak, 19. “They told him to go back to Mexico. They told him: ‘This is Shenandoah. You don’t belong here.’ “
Mr. Piekarski’s lawyer, Frederick J. Fanelli, said Mr. Ramírez had started the brawl after taking offense at an innocent comment that one of a group of six Shenandoah Valley High School football players made to a girl who was with him.
Of the prosecutors, Mr. Fanelli said: “They chose to make this case about race. Why when the injured person is white is it a street fight, and when the injured person is a minority is it a hate crime?”
The beating occurred on the night of July 12, and Mr. Ramírez died of head injuries two days later. Mr. Piekarski faces the most serious charge, criminal homicide, because, prosecutors say, he kicked Mr. Ramírez in the head as he lay unconscious on the ground after being punched by another of the six youths. That kick proved to be the fatal blow, the prosecution says.
Mr. Donchak is charged with aggravated assault and other counts, including that of supplying a dozen 40-ounce bottles of malt liquor to his five friends before the fight.
Both defendants are also charged with ethnic intimidation.
The state charged two others in the group as well. One of them, Colin Walsh, 17, was accused of delivering the punch that knocked Mr. Ramírez unconscious. But state charges against Mr. Walsh were dropped, and he was charged instead in a federal case that has been sealed.
The other youth, who is charged as a juvenile, spoke many of the slurs directed at Mr. Ramírez, prosecutors say. His case has not yet been heard. Both he and Mr. Walsh are expected to testify as prosecution witnesses.
The furor surrounding Mr. Ramírez’s death brought demonstrations to Shenandoah last summer on behalf of immigrant rights, and counterdemonstrations as well. The largest, by groups favoring a crackdown on illegal immigrants, drew more than 500 people.
Then, when a protest outside the Pottsville courthouse, by a group supporting immigrant rights, grew so loud that it disrupted a preliminary hearing for Mr. Piekarski and Mr. Donchak, the county sheriff decided to bolster security for the trial.
Determined to keep protesters a quarter-mile from the courthouse, the sheriff, Joseph G. Groody, called in help from the local police and state troopers, who patrolled the area surrounding the courthouse Monday while a half-dozen sheriff’s deputies guarded the courtroom.
But a large rally against illegal immigration was canceled, and only three people in all showed up outside the courthouse, holding signs that said, “Self-Defense Knows No Race.”
“So far it’s been good, and I hope it stays that way,” Sheriff Groody said. “But when it comes down to the day of the verdict, I’m sure that will be a busy day.”
The sheriff said he hoped the trial would produce some larger lessons. “People have to learn to live together,” he said. “We have to learn to get along in society.”
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment