Sentencing Delayed for Panhandle Boys Who Killed Their Father By Bill Kaczor Associated Press Writer
Published: Sep 18, 2002 PENSACOLA, Fla. (AP) -
Sentencing for two boys convicted of killing their father was delayed Wednesday by a judge, who also is considering defense motions for a new trial.

Alex and Derek King, ages 13 and 14, had been scheduled for sentencing Oct. 17, but Circuit Judge Frank Bell reset it for Dec. 4-5, deciding he would need two days after conferring with defense lawyers and the prosecutor. Bell said the delay would give a court-appointed psychiatrist sufficient time to examine the brothers, according to conference notes released by the court clerk's office. A jury convicted the brothers on Sept. 6 of second-degree murder without a weapon for killing their father, Terry King, 40, although evidence indicated he had been bludgeoned with an aluminum baseball bat. The boys also were convicted of arson for setting their house on fire. The brothers are facing adult prison terms of 22 to years to life under sentencing guidelines, but Bell can go below the minimum. The boys would have received automatic sentences of life without parole if the jury had convicted them of first-degree murder as charged. Family members and opponents of prosecuting children as adults are collecting petition signatures urging leniency. In media interviews, jurors said they were stunned to learn a separate jury acquitted an adult co-defendant, convicted child molester Ricky Chavis, 40. He also had been charged with the Nov. 26 murder in nearby Cantonment. The King brothers' jurors said they believed Chavis wielded the bat but convicted the boys of second-degree murder because they had let him inside the house and were present during the killing. Neither defense nor prosecution suggested that theory.

Assistant State Attorney David Rimmer argued Derek swung the bat after Alex urged him to kill their father, just as the boys confessed to police a day after the killing. Defense lawyers argued Chavis killed the victim while the brothers were hiding in the trunk of Chavis' car. Both boys recanted their confessions and told that story at Chavis' trial. Only Alex testified at the brothers' trial. Motions on behalf of both brothers for a new trial and another to reverse Alex's conviction are based on the state's conflicting theories on who killed Terry King and the hybrid version the King boys' jury came up with. "I can cite to no case that covers this unique and regrettable set of facts," defense lawyer James Stokes wrote on behalf of Alex. "As attorneys, we may have been hampered by our legal education, which allowed us to accept the legal fiction that two criminal prosecutions, each alleging a different person killed Terry King, was logical and could remain independent of factual determinations," Stokes added. He argued the brothers' jury failed to follow the law and that Rimmer was guilty of prosecutorial misconduct. Bell heard similar arguments before and during the King brothers' trial and rejected them.

Rimmer argued at trial that the King brothers should not be able to escape prosecution by changing their story. He did not argue to the Chavis jury that Chavis alone wielded the bat. Instead, he told jurors it was up to them to decide if the brothers lied in their police statements or trial testimony. Conference notes also indicated a juror had asked to meet with Bell, who said he would do so only after the case is completed and with the lawyers present.

AP-ES-09-18-02 1813EDT