What Set Them Off?
At 12:40 a.m. on Sunday, Jan. 8, in the flush of exhilaration and tree-top emotions that surge in young people after a rhythmically pounding party that draws hundreds from all over Greater Los Angeles, two cars of teens approached each other a few blocks away on National Boulevard. The boys eyed each other suspiciously as the SUV and the sedan drew closer.
According to police, the celebrants in one car may have been flying emotionally because they had participated in the latest raucous hip-hop party at the Debbie Allen dance studio. At least some of the boys in the other car may have had their daubers down. Officials believe they came to Culver City expressly for the party but evidently did not get inside.
This was to be an explosive youthful confrontation that was strictly modern. Both vehicles, the larger and the smaller, were late model.
Authorities told thefrontpageonline.com they are not certain what provided the precise spark that led to the one-shot murder of seventeen-year-old Rashid Ali of south Los Angeles. Murky hand gestures may have been to blame, some speculate. Possibly a single-finger salute tipped racing feelings over the edge.
Suspects Were Caught Quickly
Meanwhile, the stunned boys in Mr. Ali’s car stopped, hailed help,Culver City paramedics were summoned, and their friend was taken to a hospital where he died later on Sunday.
All four boys in the car from which the fatal shot allegedly originated were apprehended moments later, without a struggle. Two were shortly released and two ultimately were charged by the District Attorney with murder.
Donovan N. Halcomb, seventeen years old, was the other youth charged with murder. His hometown was identified by officials as Moreno Valley, far from Long Beach. It is not known how well Mr. Halcomb and Mr. Casey know each other.
Three days after Mr. Ali died, Culver City police went to the Poly High campus in Long Beach to arrest Mr. Casey. To spare the young man the embarrassment of being the target of curious classmates, a campus police officer came for him. He first was taken to a facility in downtown Los Angeles and later to Sylmar.
His identity did not become widely known until about ten days later when the Press-Telegram discovered a hometown celebrity was in jail. They bannered the news.
Mr. Casey’s mother, Collette Burns, went on offense immediately, defending her just-turned-eighteen son as a model of comportment in private and public. “My boy is a good boy,” she told the Press-Telegram. “He was in the wrong place at the wrong time.”
Portraying her son as a solemn young man of religious faith, Ms. Burns told a Long Beach reporter he was in a state of some serenity. His words to her were: “Mama, I’m just going to hold up my head and keep in prayer.” Ms. Burns boasted that her son has been working since the age of five, that he knows how to “lay a roof,” and that he recently repaired her sink. One sister said he came over in the middle of the night to fix the toilet in her home.
Ms. Burns, who visits her son on Sundays, said he was “not scared.” She is confident that truth will prevail. “He didn’t do nothing wrong,” she said. “He has nothing to be scared of.” Nevertheless, the teenager known to his family as Ray-Ray was behind bars on his eighteenth birthday.
A less optimistic outlook is sketched by authorities even though Mr. Casey’s family says that he was not the triggerman. Without identifying the shooter, Culver City Lt. Dean Williams described what is known as a felony murder rule for thefrontpageonline.com. He said that when a suspect is found to have been an “active participant” in a crime, under law he can be judged as guilty as the person who wields the weapon. That is, the driver of a getaway car could be found as culpable as the actual killer.
That Would be One Version
Delving into a gray area that appears to widen, or muddy, the felony murder rule concept, Mr. Williams asked, “At what point does a crime end? When you are driving away? Another time?”
His coaches, a principal at the school and his older sisters strenuously defended Mr. Casey. His mother insisted on referring to the other three boys in the car as “associates” rather than friends. If they were friends, she said, they would not have placed her son in such a tragic position.
Taking note of Ms. Burns’ detailed description of the late night events, Mr. Williams of the Culver City police said firmly, “A mother’s version of what happened is from someone who was not there.”
And so, Mr. Casey, a good enough football player to have been in line for a full scholarship at the University of Oregon, ponders an unknowable future.
Equally unclear are the course and the degree of intensity with which City Hall will pursue action against Ms. Allen.
She has long been regarded as a showcase asset to the community. There is a however that looms large, though. Ms. Allen’s premises have been made available on numerous occasions, authorities say, to a hip-hop promoter known as Tommy the Clown. Friction developed months ago, sources said, when Tommy the Clown allegedly balked at obtaining a Special Events permit to make the staging of a party legal.
Private and discreet meetings were to be held between Interim Police Chief Bill Burck, Chief Administrative Officer Jerry Fulwood, City Atty. Carol Schwab, Bill LaPointe of Parks and Recrecreation and the Fire Dept., on one side, with Ms. Allen and/or Hayden Tract magnate Frederick Smith on the other side of the table. “I don’t anticipate any problems with Ms. Allen,” Mr. Burck told thefrontpageonline.com.
Officials say the noisy parties at Ms. Allen’s dance center have caused a bombardment of complaints from neighbors. The hip-hoppers’ public and private behavior will not be tolerated by City Hall, a source said. .