News & Politics - 11 year old California girl faces felony assault charge

TokyoNiGHTS · 08-03-2005, 11:04 AM

Glad to see police going after these hardened criminals.

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An 11-year old girl faces felony assault charges after seeking emergency help for a boy whom she says she accidentally injured after he bullied her with water balloons.

Maribel Cuevas was arrested, handcuffed and taken by police to juvenile hall, where she spent five days with only minimal contact with her parents.

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Her family says Maribel meant no harm when she accidentally hit Elijah Vang, the 9-year-old neighborhood boy, in the forehead with a rock. They say she was simply defending herself after Vang and several other boys pummeled her with water balloons outside her home in a poor Fresno neighborhood in April. Vang’s family isn’t pressing charges and has since moved away.

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Maribel, who speaks limited English, spent five days in juvenile hall with just one half-hour visit from her parents. She then spent about 30 days under house arrest, forced to wear a GPS ankle bracelet to monitor her whereabouts. She’s charged with assault with a deadly weapon and is due in court Aug. 3.

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The aunt of one of Maribel’s playmates saw the boy’s forehead was cut. She got him a towel to stop the bleeding, and called 911, the family said.

Maribel ran to the boy’s house, two blocks from her own, to tell his parents she was sorry, she said.

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Maribel panicked. The officers had the slight girl down on the ground, and one of them put his knee to her back to restrain her, her mother said in Spanish.

http://blog.lawinfo.com/2005/07/15/c...ssault-charge/

Despite the family of the boy not wanting to press charges, the prosecution is going ahead with the case that could land the girl in a correctional facility for up to 3 years. What message do they plan to send by doing something like this?

WalkingOnSunshine · 08-03-2005, 12:13 PM

This article here is quite different in some aspects than the one from above.

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Police defended their actions, saying Maribel intended to hurt the boy and resisted arrest, kicking toward the officers and scratching one on the arm.

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She picked up one of the rocks that had been tossed at her and tried to pretend to throw it, she said, but it slipped out of her hand and hit Elijah in the forehead.

Maribel's brother gave Elijah a towel to hold over his bleeding cut. She said she went to Elijah's house to tell his parents he was hurt, but they weren't there.

Pretty good aim for an accidental throw, in my opinion. Also, in this article it says that she went to the boy's home to tell his parents he was hurt. It does not say that she was going there to apologize, as did the above article.

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"I placed her into handcuffs and she began struggling with us," the police report says. "She threw herself to the ground and started kicking at" one of the officers, the report continues. "We were able to get Cuevas into the back of the patrol vehicle and she began kicking the door and continued crying."

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But critics of the Police Department's actions, including Maribel's father, say the treatment would have been different if Mirabel wasn't a Latina living in one of the city's poorer neighborhoods.

"If this was a middle-class or upper-class neighborhood it would have been a very different outcome," said the Rev. Floyd Harris Jr., who led a 100- person vigil Friday in front of Juvenile Hall to support Maribel.

"Police don't have the same respect for people of color in this town," Harris said.

And yet again the race card is played when something happens.

Article - http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/articl...type=printable

Lexis · 08-03-2005, 12:45 PM

This just doesn't seem an appropriate level of punishment, even if she had thrown the rock. The boy was not seriously hurt and his parents are not pressing charges. The girl did something stupid but it wasn't like she beat him or pulled a weapon.

TokyoNiGHTS · 08-03-2005, 12:53 PM

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Originally Posted by WalkingOnSunshine

Pretty good aim for an accidental throw, in my opinion. Also, in this article it says that she went to the boy's home to tell his parents he was hurt. It does not say that she was going there to apologize, as did the above article.

I don't care if she did intend to do it, she doesn't deserve the punishments she's getting. Possible 3 years in an instiutuion? 30 days house arrest with an ankle bracelet? Putting an 11 year old girl on the ground and sticking your knee in her back? For what? A kid being a kid? This isn't a malicious assault and it seemed like the 2 worked it out on their own as did the parents.

Why weren't the boys arrested? What they were doing is considered assault too. This is as crazy as those officers that have been using tasers on children.

*Lauren · 08-03-2005, 11:11 PM

The article mentions that the girl struggled AFTER she was put in handcuffs. Why are they putting cuffs on an 11 year old child?

GhostWriter · 08-04-2005, 02:03 AM

In a state where drugs and violence reign supreme if you know where to look, the police have nothing better to do than harass a kid that cannot speak english? Come on now, how isn't there something wrong with that picture?

In Fair Verona · 08-06-2005, 10:25 PM

I agree with most of the above posts. What she did was stupid and wrong but her punishment is way more severe than it should be. In fact, I don't think the government should be enacting any punishment at all if the victim's family doesn't want to press charges.

That is a little girl, not a criminal, and they are treating her like one.

I really think they should just let it go now, I'm sure everybody has learned their lesson. Regardless of whether it was a race issue, pelting water balloons is mean and those boys probably won't do it again now. Throwing a rock is harsh too, and after getting a knee in the back and hand-cuffed, she probably won't do it again either.

I work with kids, so I've seen tantrums and struggling, the kicking and screaming and physical violence in reponse is so not the way to go about it... you give the kid what they want, give them a false sense of security, then get them.

Marissa · 08-07-2005, 09:30 AM

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Originally Posted by Lexis

This just doesn't seem an appropriate level of punishment, even if she had thrown the rock. The boy was not seriously hurt and his parents are not pressing charges. The girl did something stupid but it wasn't like she beat him or pulled a weapon.

I agree. And I'm sure if I were an 11 year old girl who didn't speak the language and was wrestled down by cops, I'd probably be kicking and screaming, too.

And I love the part where it says she threw back one of the rocks that was thrown at HER...so it could have been done to her too...she could have been the one with the rock in the head, but no one cares about that... the people who should have been responsible for the punishment are her parents and the boy's parents. She's just a kid, and kids do stupid things like that (I should know, I threw a fork at my brother once)...but it's not the polce's place to decide the punishment.

And while I think the "race card" may not be appropriate in this case, I do think that there's gotta be a reason it keeps coming up. I think it's pretty silly to claim that a white person and a black person are treated equally in our justice system, because that's just not true.

barbeegurl00 · 08-08-2005, 02:12 AM

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Originally Posted by TokyoNiGHTS

I don't care if she did intend to do it, she doesn't deserve the punishments she's getting. Possible 3 years in an instiutuion? 30 days house arrest with an ankle bracelet? Putting an 11 year old girl on the ground and sticking your knee in her back? For what? A kid being a kid? This isn't a malicious assault and it seemed like the 2 worked it out on their own as did the parents.

Why weren't the boys arrested? What they were doing is considered assault too. This is as crazy as those officers that have been using tasers on children.

Exactly. The treatment of her is ridiculous and uncalled for.


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