Print
E-mail
Share
digg
Newsvine
Facebook
Stumble
Technorati
reddit
Fark
twitterTeen gets life sentence in shooting of high school freshman
Published Monday, Oct. 26, 2009 | 11:34 a.m.
Updated Monday, Oct. 26, 2009 | 1:27 p.m.
Christopher Privett
Related stories
- Judge upholds guilty plea in drive-by shooting case (10-12-2009)
- Teen might back out of murder plea in student’s death (8-26-2009)
- Man sentenced in shooting death of Palo Verde freshman (8-5-2009)
- Second teen pleads guilty in Palo Verde student slaying (7-1-2009)
- Teen pleads guilty in shooting death of Palo Verde freshman (6-24-2009)
- Teens charged in shooting death of Palo Verde student get separate trials (1-8-2009)
- Palo Verde retires jersey of slain athlete (9-19-2008)
- Shooting rattles affluent suburb (2-26-2008)
- Judge holds teens to stand trial as gang members in killing near Palo Verde High (4-28-2008)
Three short words forever changed Joshua Privett’s life.
“Christopher is dead,” his father told him over the phone. Joshua’s youngest brother, who was 15 years old, had been shot in the chest while walking home from Palo Verde High School with his friends.
Christopher Privett was an honors student. He was an athlete. His future was nothing but bright, Joshua Privett said Monday.
“When my dad called me, I didn’t understand why Christopher was killed. Today, I still don’t understand why he was killed,” Joshua Privett said during a sentencing hearing for the 17-year-old boy who shot and killed his brother.
District Court Judge Stefany Miley today sentenced Gerald Davison to life in prison. Authorities say Davison fired a semi-automatic pistol from the backseat of a car into a group of four boys on Feb. 18, 2008.
Under a plea agreement, the earliest Davison could be released from prison is 28 years.
According to police reports, a gray Pontiac driven by Ezekiel Williams passed by Christopher and three of his friends who were walking home along Alta Drive. Witnesses told police that harsh words and gang signs were exchanged between members of the two groups.
Christopher has been described as an innocent bystander.
Williams, 20, was sentenced in August to a minimum of eight years on one count of voluntary manslaughter with use of a deadly weapon and one count of accessory to murder for his role in the shooting.
One of the bullets Davison fired struck Christopher in the chest. Another bullet passed through the backpack of one of the other boys, but the boy wasn't injured. Christopher died at Summerlin Hospital.
"I apologize for taking your son's life away. Sorry ain't gonna cut it, but that's all I can tell you," Davison told the Privett family Monday during the hearing.
“With a single, callous act, Gerald Davison has hurt more people in a moment than most people do in a lifetime,” Joshua Privett said.
Davison pleaded guilty in July to first-degree murder with a deadly weapon and attempted murder.
Under the agreement, Davison was sentenced to a minimum of 20 years and a maximum of life for murder, and an additional four to 10 years with a weapons enhancement; additionally, Davison will serve another four to 10 years for a count of attempted murder.
Christopher’s parents spoke to Davison from the stand. Barbara Privett told Davison he shattered her life the day he shot her son.
“I keep hoping that some day Chris will walk in the door and say, ‘hi mom!’ or that I’ll open his bedroom door and see him laying on the bed. I know that’s not going to happen,” she said. “Instead, I have an urn of ashes beside my bed. That’s all I have left of Chris.”
“The feeling of loss overwhelms me some days,” said Christopher’s father, Michael Privett. “It’s with me always.”
He told Davison that his family is still struggling with the aftermath of a crime he described as “selfish” and “senseless.”
Over the summer, he took his son’s ashes with him as he retraced times he spent with Christopher. He sprinkled ashes in places they had been together, and left others at points he thought Christopher would have enjoyed.
All he hopes for, he said, is for something good to grow out of Christopher’s death.
He said his pain has manifested itself in a memorial: There’s a place in the desert near his house where he walks when he’s grieving. When he thinks about Christopher, he stacks rocks on the cairn he’s been building since his son’s death.
“I just wish that perhaps with sentencing there would be a new sense of trying to do something to make things better,” he said.
Discussion: 25 comments so far…
Post a comment
- Most Read
- Discussed
- Most E-mailed
- Man, 18, arrested for DUI in crash that kills woman, 24
- Man fatally shot during robbery attempt of woman
- Binion’s to close all 365 rooms, lay off 100 workers
- Ex-NBA star to pay $12,835 monthly in gambling debt case
- Slot makers team up at behest of CityCenter
- “Last Call!”: Two words you wouldn’t expect to hear on The Strip
- Now, Rebels must build on big Louisville win
- Report: 70 percent of homeowners underwater
- Scuffle in pub parking lot leads to Las Vegas attorney’s arrest
- What reactions to Palin, Stewart say about society
Blogs
The Kats Report
Planet Hollywood's Thomas McCartney headed for Tropicana (7 Comments)
Elsewhere
LV woman robs Kentucky strip club, police say (2 Comments)
Las Vegas Sands' Hong Kong IPO flops
The Kats Report
Monday List: Top 13 Moments and Observations From Thanksgiving Weekend (3 Comments)
Politics: Ralston's Flash
Tarkanian: Reid is liberal, out of touch, rude, poisonously partisan and a know-it-all (10 Comments)
The Kats Report
Barry Manilow off to Paris: Two-year deal starts March 5 at Le Theatre des Arts (10 Comments)
Politics: Ralston's Flash
Ensign survives radio interview with no follow-ups; partial transcript below (8 Comments)
Calendar »
- 1 Tue
- 2 Wed
- 3 Thu
- 4 Fri
- 5 Sat
-
Grand opening of Vdara
Vdara | 10 a.m. to 11:59 p.m.
-
Dik Richie at Moon
Moon Nightclub | 10:30 p.m. to 11:59 p.m.
-
A Night to Honor Israel at the Cashman Theatre
Cashman Convention Center | 7 p.m. to 10 p.m.
-
Ladies night at Feelgoods
Feelgoods
-
Sin City Sinners at VooDoo Lounge
VooDoo Steak & Lounge
The Sun
Locally owned and independent for more than 50 years.
I'd being willing to chip in for a one-way ticket to Afghanistan where Gerald's talents would make him a hero instead of a villian.
"Wars, conflict - it's all business. One murder makes a villain; millions, a hero. Numbers sanctify, my good fellow!" -- Monsieur Verdoux
: )
http://www.experiencesummerlin.com/
The new saying is "Summerlin is happening"...
They forgot the rest.
Summerlin is happening to go downhill like every other community in Vegas.
Haley, that statement is inane. This was a killing without purpose, a thrill-kill, you might say. War is war ... whether you believe it's right or wrong. I don't know what Davison's reasoning was, but it boils down to pure stupidity ... and we've got to get rid of stupidity. Bye Bye Gerald. See you when you're about 50 or so ... maybe. What a waste of two lives.
Laker -- then he'd fit right in over there, especially if they assigned him to Bagram. For perspective _ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dilawar_(hu...)
bigb: of course !
Harley, it seems as though you are comparing a low-life, urban ghetto animal to one of our U.S. soldiers. To say that a soldier's actions are only different from this loser's is because of the context in which it occurred is absolutely absurd. You are probably one of these guys who has never fought for something you believe in - ever. And you probably never will. I wouldn't expect you to understand the difference. I do hope that others who are educated and have at least a little common sense read your comment and think that you are as dumb as I do.
Summerlin used to be a very pleasing place to drive through and visit. The landscaping around the public streets was always well done and kept up. Lots of flowers. They had a very high profile security force that drove white trucks and kept vigil. Although there are thousands more homes and millions more in revenues, those services are no longer budgeted. Much of the floral landscaping has been replaced by bushes and unattractive ground cover. There should be an investigation.
Big burly Harley drove a stand-up forklift delivering parts to the various fabrication stations throughout the plant.
Whenever Harley passed the stations labored by Vietnamese he took the time to stop, point a finger, and in a grizzly baritone voice remind them he was once PAID to kill them for a living.
I am your American killer, your hero?
: )
bigb
Yes, I believe they were.
Top 10 Safest Metropolitan Cities in America:
1 Minneapolis-St. Paul-Bloomington, MN
2 Milwaukee-Waukesha-West Allis, WI
3 Portland-Vancouver-Beaverton, OR-WA
4 Boston-Cambridge-Quincy, MA-NH
4 Seattle-Tacoma-Bellevue, WA
You mean no illegals were involved in this?
Top 10 Safest Metropolitan Cities in America: (continued)
6. Providence-New Bedford-Fall River, RI-MA
7. San Jose-Sunnyvale-Santa Clara, CA
8. New York-Northern New Jersey-Long Island, NY-NJ
9. Cincinnati-Middletown, OH-KY
10. Cleveland-Elyria-Mentor, OH
10. Denver-Aurora, CO
Let's round out the top 20 of Top Safest Cities in America:
12. Detroit-Warren-Livonia, MI
13. San Diego-Carlsbad-San Marcos, CA
14. Phoenix-Mesa-Scottsdale, AZ
15. Chicago-Naperville-Joliet, IL
15. Austin-Round Rock, TX
15. Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington, TX
18. Pittsburgh, PA
19. Los Angeles-Long Beach-Santa Ana, CA
20. Washington-Arlington-Alexandria, DC-VA-MD
This dog should have been put down!
Roll the dice kiddo,there gonna own your butt................
very true....ther is no difference between what it takes internally to kill either in war or on the street...just in war you have no repercussions although these days I think they saddle the troops with too many rules if its war.. i'm sorry no rules war is war...the other major difference is that kid that got life was a a coward he shot a defenseless kid.. not a man that was intenet on killing him...
Fresh Meat!!! well maybe not so fresh,, but certainly new.
Bye Bye, see ya Gerald! Have a nice life rotting away where you belong!
Another innocent white kid getting killed by a black...when was the last time you read about a white kid killing a black?