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Case #2925 Rating: 4.3 out of 5
Two sharks, one ray tortured at aquarium
Long Beach, CA (US)Incident Date: Monday, Nov 8, 2004
County: Los Angeles
Disposition: Convicted
Defendants/Suspects:
» 13 year old boy
» 14 year old boy
» 13 year old boy
» 13 year old boy
Case Updates: 3 update(s) available
Police reported four vandals were arrested Tuesday in the torture and killing of two sharks at the Aquarium of the Pacific in Long Beach, Calif. One shark and one ray were discovered dead at the Aquarium early Monday, and a second shark was barely alive following a case of brutal animal cruelty.
The boys -- three 13-year-olds and one 14-year-old -- were caught Monday night after a security spotted one of them dropping over a fence and into the shark lagoon area. He and three others were chased down and caught. .
Staff members arrived early Monday before the Aquarium opened its doors and were having their usual walk through the plant when several people made the gruesome discovery at Shark Lagoon, said Perry Hampton, director of animal husbandry. A nurse shark, named Michelle, and a bamboo shark and cow-nosed ray - a relative of the sting ray - were dragged from their touch tanks and tortured, then left for dead by unknown vandals.
The crime occurred sometime between the point when the Aquarium closed Sunday at 6 p.m. and opened Monday at 9 a.m. The bamboo shark, which measured about 18 inches, was found barely alive and is not expected to survive. The nurse shark, which was about 3-feet long, and the ray, which was slightly larger than a laptop computer, were already dead when they were discovered outside their tank.
Shark Lagoon and its inhabitants of touchable critters is a serene environment and the most popular exhibit at the Aquarium, Fisher said.
The sharks and rays some with slick skin and others rough to the touch swim all day among the fluttering fingers of children and adults. Designed to educate people about the true nature of sharks, the exhibit demonstrates that the majority of the feared fish are absolutely no threat to humans.
Nurse sharks, like the rays and the bamboo sharks, zebra sharks and epaulette sharks that live in the touch tanks, are bottom feeders who prefer crabs and snails to fish, or people's fingers.
The bamboo shark is full grown, as was the ray, Hampton said.
The touch pools are one area of the Aquarium that is outside, although they are protected by high walls and fences. Hampton said he was told not to discuss the building's security system. Pending the outcome of the investigation, the Aquarium may consider making changes to the area, Fisher added.
To send a polite letter to the prosecuting attorney on this case, requesting that he prosecute the teens to the fullest extent of the law, and request mandatory counseling if they are convicted, write to:
The Honorable Steve Cooley
Los Angeles County District Attorney
415 W. Ocean Blvd.
Long Beach, CA 90802
Case UpdatesThe three adolescent boys responsible for the fatal attacks on two sharks and a cow-nosed ray at the Aquarium of the Pacific three months ago have been sentenced to nine months in a long-term juvenile camp for violent offenders. Two of the boys admitted to four felony counts of animal cruelty and one count of vandalism at a hearing Tuesday in Los Padrinos Juvenile Hall, said Deputy District Attorney Debra Lamb, who prosecuted the case.
The third boy received the same sentence at a Feb. 4 Long Beach hearing.
In addition to spending time in the lock-down camp, the boys - each of them 13-year-old Franklin Middle School students - were ordered to perform 150 hours of community service cleaning up the beach.
They are barred from associating with each other and from entering the aquarium. And, while in custody, they will receive counseling on impulse control and anger management through a special program for violent offenders, Lamb said.
"I don't think we could have expected or gotten anything more," she said.
The Nov. 8 attacks at the aquarium inspired anger, shock and heartfelt sadness from many Long Beach residents, including hundreds of children who count the seven-year-old aquarium among the few local sources of wildlife education.
The boys entered the outdoor Shark Lagoon late at night, dragged a 3-foot nurse shark from her touch pool, slammed her against the concrete and dragged her behind the aquarium to die. They also flung a bamboo shark onto the lorikeet exhibit and stabbed a cow-nosed ray. Both animals were left to die in the open air.
The fourth count of animal cruelty, Lamb said, related to the maiming of a zebra shark, which survived the attack. And the vandalism charge grew out an incident in which the boys cut open shark pod eggs.
She said the impact on the aquarium couldn't be overstated.
Staff members had come to know the animals well by working with them daily. Many of the animals had names.
Lamb said the day the staff came to work and started recovering the animal carcasses, they were hard-pressed at first to find an explanation.
"They were just so shocked at what had happened there," she said. "It took them a while to even grasp, as they were finding things, what would have went on. They just thought it would never happen, so I think there were a lot of people really devastated over that."
The boys were arrested the following night while returning to the scene with a fourth boy, age 14. That boy was earlier sentenced to three months in a probation camp.
The matter started out in Long Beach, where two juvenile judges recused themselves, but not before one of them, Commissioner John Ing, could issue a gag order in the case, preventing officials from talking to the media.
When Ing recused himself, the case was transferred to Compton Superior Court. But the Compton justice, Judge Charles Clay, was challenged by defense attorneys, prompting the case to be sent to Los Padrinos in Downey, where the boys had been detained since their arrests, officials said. | Source: Press-Telegram - Feb 15, 2005
Update posted on Feb 18, 2005 - 4:49PM |
Two of the four have offered emotional apologies. One has pleaded guilty, and the other three will have a hearing in juvenile court next month.
"How do we save these kids?" aquarium President and Chief Executive Officer Jerry Schubel said. "If we come out of this and these kids are sociopaths cruel to animals, we have as a society failed." Because they are juveniles, the boys have not been identified. Their court proceedings are closed to the public, so only the briefest of details have been revealed. All four attend the same school in a working-class residential neighborhood at the eastern edge of downtown Long Beach.
One lives with an adult sister. Some of their parents have needed court proceedings translated. At least one boy has a history of fights and other problems at school.
Two of them have apologized in writing. One was the 14-year-old, who pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit animal cruelty and was sentenced last week to three months in a juvenile camp. In court that day, he pulled a note out of a sock and read to the court a half-page apology.
His mother and relatives crying softly behind him, he clutched the note with shackled hands and began, "Dear people" and concluded by stressing that he had not actually hurt any animals.
"I'm human," he wrote, "and humans make mistakes."
The second boy wrote directly to the aquarium chief, who paraphrased most of what he took to be a genuinely remorseful appeal. One line in particular resonated: "He said, 'I lost my dignity that night,'" Schubel recalled.
"That got to me," he said. "That was moving to me. It gave me some hope he's not lost."
A third boy is represented by attorney John Schmocker.
"He's a normal boy. This is not a monster or a disturbed child," he said. "I'm more disturbed by people's greater concern for fish than for people being killed." Schmocker said he hoped the public would understand that although the boys might have done something wrong, they were not hard-core criminals.
"You know what strikes me is, they're only 13. They're immature, and they're really facing adult consequences," he said. "It was juvenile mischief rather than anything darker."
But why the boys were out so late on a school night -- their whereabouts apparently unknown to parents and guardians -- and what they did before arriving at the aquarium are questions to which the prosecutor doesn't have answers. She said juvenile authorities did not ask the boys about such details, possibly considering them moot after police said they had confessed.
Two of the four boys' families who were reached by a reporter declined to be interviewed.
The judge's comments before sentencing the 14-year-old hinted at what he called "instability" in the boy's home life, the boy's lawyer said.
The boy was living with an adult sister at the time of the attacks, a result of friction with one or more siblings, the attorney said. And a stepfather who had not been living in the home moved back in before sentencing.
"The judge observed that (the boy) had been very well the past month in a structured setting," prosecutor Callaghan said, referring to a county juvenile camp. "And he ordered psychological counseling for the whole family." The boy's mother declined to be interviewed outside court, in part because she speaks almost no English.
But in the courtroom after the judge's verdict, she offered a teary-eyed apology to the aquarium president, who attended the proceedings.
"I'm sorry," she whispered to Schubel.
Gallagher said the maximum sentence the 13-year-olds could face if convicted of all charges would be about nine years in the California Youth Authority. They also could be sentenced to varying terms in a lockdown juvenile camp operated by the Los Angeles County Probation Department.
Included in the 14-year-old's sentence was a requirement of 150 hours of community service that the aquarium asked to be in on. | Source: Los Angeles Times - Dec 26, 2004
Update posted on Dec 29, 2004 - 4:37AM |
One of four teens charged in connection with the killing of two sharks and a ray pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit animal abuse Thursday, the district attorney's office said.
Prosecutors dropped a second charge of burglary against the 14-year-old boy, said Deputy District Attorney Sheila Callaghan, head of the Long Beach juvenile office.
Authorities said the boy was at the Aquarium of the Pacific in Long Beach only once and was arrested before any animals were killed on the second night, Nov. 8.
The plea was not part of a plea agreement, according to Jane Robison, a spokeswoman for the Los Angeles district attorney's office.
The youth remains in custody and is scheduled to be sentenced Dec. 8. He could be sentenced to probation or time at the California Youth Authority.
Three 13-year-olds charged in the animals' deaths are scheduled to return to court Jan. 11 to set a date for their trial.
Each is charged with two counts of commercial burglary, four counts of animal cruelty, two counts of vandalism and two counts of conspiracy to commit animal cruelty.
All the charges are felonies, and the teens could face up to nine years in detention if convicted.
Authorities contend that the three entered the outdoor Shark Lagoon exhibit late Nov. 7 or early Nov. 8, dragged a 3-foot nurse shark from a touch pool, slammed her against the concrete and dragged the animal to some shrubs to die.
The teens also allegedly flung a 2-foot-long bamboo shark onto a bird exhibit and pulled a cow-nosed ray from a touch tank and stabbed it before leaving it on the ground. | Source: Mercury News - Dec 2, 2004
Update posted on Dec 3, 2004 - 7:06AM |
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