Lawyer lauds dismissal of charges against client, 13

Friday, May 27, 2005 | 9:35 a.m.

A defense attorney who is also a university regent hopes a 13-year-old boy who narrowly avoided murder charges has learned a lesson about the importance of education from his brush with the criminal justice system.

Two 17-year-old boys pleaded not guilty Thursday to one count of murder and three counts of attempted murder in a shooting Feb. 12, but a justice of the peace had dismissed the case against the 13-year-old who had been in the car with them.

Victor Valencia and Abram Madrid both pleaded not guilty to murder with use of a deadly weapon, three counts of attempted murder with use of a deadly weapon and one count of conspiracy to commit murder in the death of Manuel Mora. They are scheduled to stand trial on Oct. 3 before District Judge Joseph Bonaventure.

Attorney James Dean Leavitt, a member of the university system Board of Regents who defended the 13-year-old, said he was thankful that North Las Vegas Justice of the Peace Stephen Dahl listened closely to the evidence and concluded the 13-year-old wasn't an accomplice to the murder. He dismissed the case during a preliminary hearing May 12.

Leavitt said the 13-year-old simply exercised "poor judgment" when he got in the car with Valencia and Madrid.

"I think it was the right decision and the judge showed a lot of courage in dismissing the charges against my client," Leavitt said. "From the way the testimony was brought up, the prosecutors never showed my client participated in the agreement to commit the shootings."

Leavitt said Dahl's ruling was a "tremendous result from the standpoint that it only takes a scintilla of evidence to bind a case over (from Justice Court to District Court)."

Leavitt said the 13-year-old's actions, although luckily not criminal in this case, was an example of how teenagers who fail to attend school and take their education seriously can find themselves in bad situations.

"This is just another example that the difference between kids that succeed and don't is education," Leavitt said. "Anytime I see someone this young implicated in a murder, it raises the greater public policy issue of how important education is."

Leavitt said he has scheduled meetings with both the 13-year-old and his parents to "come into my office so I can stress the importance of education."

"It's the right thing to do because this kid is someone that can still be saved from a life of crime and the streets," Leavitt said.