SAN FRANCISCO — An appeals court upheld a Contra Costa judge’s decision to send a teen to a detention center run by the California prison system, rather than juvenile hall, for stabbing his friend’s brother with a hunting knife, nearly killing the victim.
The Concord teen, who this newspaper is not naming, was 16 years old in May 2019, when he used an eight-inch hunting knife to stab his 14-year-old friend’s brother nine times with a hunting knife, then ran to a nearby Dairy Queen on Treat Boulevard, asking an employee if he could use the phone. He then called 911 and explained he believed the victim was going to kill him and that he might be suffering from a mental illness, according to court records.
The boy eventually accepted a plea deal and an aggravated assault conviction, as well as a six-year detention term, according to the appellate court decision. That left Judge John Kennedy with one decision: whether to send him to juvenile hall or the much more restrictive Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, Division of Juvenile Justice — formerly known as the California Youth Authority — which functions similar to an adult prison environment.
In upholding Kennedy’s decision to commit the teen to the state facility, the First District Appellate Court noted in its decision last November that the boy was found possessing weapons in juvenile hall, and had several violent incidents. Perhaps most notably, when Kennedy sentenced him, he “punched and knocked down the camera in the courtroom” then punched and kicked two officers who tried to restrain him, according to the decision.
On appeal, the teen argued that it was an “abuse of discretion” to not sentence him to the less-restrictive Youthful Offenders Treatment Program at Juvenile Hall. In rejecting this, the appeals court justices wrote that the DJJ system has services for people with “severe mental health needs.”
“Additionally, DJJ had an intensive behavioral treatment program for mentally ill wards who were aggressive and violent,” the decision says. “There was evidence in the record that DJJ programs would provide (the teen) with extensive, long-term behavioral and substance abuse counseling in a highly structured, disciplined, and closely supervised environment that would be beneficial to him. Further, DJJ had safety procedures in place to ensure wards did not possess weapons.”
At the time, authorities treated the stabbing as attempted murder and said it was lucky the victim didn’t perish. He was stabbed in the back and torso and rushed to Clayton Valley Charter High School, where a medical helicopter had landed. He was listed in critical condition when he arrived at Childrens Hospital Oakland.
The incident was similar to the infamous April 2015 murder of a 9-year-old boy, stabbed to death in his Discovery Bay home while he slept. In that case, the perpetrator said he believed the end of the world was looming, based on a mental illness that caused the delusion, and wanted to see what it was like to kill someone.
In the Concord stabbing, the teen was vaping marijuana when he became fixated on the victim and attacked him inside the living room of the home where they were hanging out. When police arrived, the teen talked about “hella strange (expletive) happening around this neighborhood” and “people following him,” and said he believed the victim intended to kill him.
