Juvenile
Jul. 25, 2002
Man Who Says He Killed at 15 Must Stand Trial as Adult
FONTANA - In a case bearing resemblance to the Michael Skakel murder trial, a San Bernardino County judge has ruled that a man who recently confessed to killing his girlfriend in 1992, when he was 15, can be tried as an adult.
Judge Gus Skropos last week ruled that Robin Woods, 25, who confessed in March to killing his girlfriend, could be tried as an adult -- even though youths who committed murders at that age a decade ago had to be tried in juvenile court.
In a July 16 ruling, Skropos held that the prosecution's retroactive use of Proposition 21 to get the case to adult court was constitutional. The ruling came a little more than month after another judge found that the prosecution could not use Proposition 21 in that fashion and dismissed the case against Woods.
In May, Judge Douglas Fettel tossed out the charges against Woods. His decision came after he ruled that Proposition 21 -- passed in 1995 to allow some 14- and 15-year-olds to be prosecuted in adult court - violated prohibitions on ex post facto laws.
Fettel reasoned that charging Woods as an adult was unconstitutional because the sentence he would face - 25 years to life - would be much harsher than the maximum juvenile court sentence allowed at the time of the murder.
If convicted of murder as a 15-year-old, Woods could have been incarcerated at the California Youth Authority until age 25.
Legal experts have said that the circumstances of the case could be unprecedented in California. The case against Woods mirrors some of the issues in the Skakel murder case in Greenwich, Conn. Skakel, 41, was convicted earlier this year of bludgeoning Martha Moxley to death with a golf club. He was 15 at the time of the killing.
Skakel originally was charged in juvenile court, but the case was transferred to adult court because there were no juvenile facilities available to accommodate the middle-aged defendant.
Skropos last week ruled that Woods should be charged with murder because the quandary over his age at the time of the killing is a "matter of jurisdiction, not ex post facto," said Lance Cantos, a deputy district attorney in the office's appellate division.
Woods confessed in late March to killing his girlfriend, Rhonda Denning, in August 1992, telling officers he wanted to come clean because the crime was "eating" at him for the past decade. Woods told authorities he fatally shot Denning after the pair attended a party together and left her body folded up in a convertible sofa in a flood-control channel in Rialto.
Shortly after the killing, officers singled Woods out as their prime suspect because he was the last person seen with Denning. But the teen-ager insisted he had nothing to do with the crime, and prosecutors declined to file charges because they lacked a confession or other hard evidence, authorities have said.
Deputy Public Defender George Taylor, counsel for Woods, could not be reached to comment Tuesday on whether his office intends to file a petition challenging Skropos' ruling.
Cantos, however, predicted that the case is going to be litigated "all the way up to the California Supreme Court."
Woods was released from jail June 2 after Fettel overturned the charges against him. The court has a warrant out for his arrest, officials said.
Jason Armstrong & Sean Windle
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