Thursday, March 6, 2008

Email this article to a friend

Youth accused in fatal school stabbing seeks dismissal of charges

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. -- A lawyer for a teenager accused of stabbing a classmate to death in a high school bathroom asked a judge to throw out the murder charge Thursday, arguing prosecutors improperly told the grand jury that it should not consider the student's mental disabilities.

John Odgren, who has a form of autism known as Asperger's Syndrome, was indicted by a grand jury on a first-degree murder charge in the Jan. 19, 2007, fatal stabbing of 15-year-old James Alenson at Lincoln-Sudbury High School.

Odgren's lawyer, Jonathan Shapiro, said Thursday that Assistant District Attorney Daniel Bennett presented evidence of Odgren's mental health diagnoses to the grand jury, but in response to questions from jurors told them they should not consider Odgren's past diagnoses or his status as a special needs student when deciding what charges, if any, Odgren should face.

Shapiro said he believed the grand jury might have indicted Odgren on a lesser charge -- either second-degree murder or manslaughter -- if it had been given more information about Asperger's Syndrome and its potential impact on Odgren's ability to plan a murder.

Under state law, one definition of first-degree murder includes deliberate premeditation, or planning, while second-degree murder and manslaughter lack premeditation.

"Aspects of Asperger's Syndrome interfere with executive function -- the ability to plan, the ability to premeditate," Shapiro said.

Bennett said he told the grand jury not to consider Odgren's disabilities or his past episodes of violence in an effort to be fair to the 17-year-old.

"We presented the evidence to the grand jury in an effort to protect the defendant from unfair prejudice," Bennett said.

Judge Isaac Borenstein did not immediately issue a ruling on the defense request.

Odgren, then 16, is accused of pouncing on Alenson in a boys' bathroom, stabbing him five times with an 11-inch knife and slashing his throat. Prosecutors said Odgren had never met Alenson before the attack and picked him at random.

The killing stunned the residents of Sudbury, an affluent suburb located about 17 miles west of Boston.

Prosecutors have said Odgren planned the killing, bringing a knife to school with him and staking out two school bathrooms looking for a victim.

In court documents, prosecutors have said Odgren kneeled beside the dying Alenson and checked his pulse.

"I did it. I just snapped. I don't know why," Odgren allegedly told a teacher who ran to the scene.

A police report also said Odgren told officers "I don't want him to die."

Odgren, of Princeton, was enrolled in a special education program at the high school. In addition to Asperger's, Odgren had previously been diagnosed with a hyperactivity disorder.

Bennett said the grand jury was given thousands of pages of Odgren's school records, which contained the Asperger's diagnosis, and heard testimony about Asperger's from the school psychologist.

"There's no evidence that had they been presented with further psychological testimony on Asperger's that any different finding would have been made," Bennett said.

But Shapiro said Bennett effectively cut off the grand jury's questions by telling them they should not consider Odgren's prior diagnoses.

Bennett said Odgren had a history of threatening other students at Lincoln-Sudbury and at other schools he attended. Among the behavior cited by prosecutors include separate incidents when Odgren brought a toy gun and a small folding knife to school and chased a student with a shard of glass.

Shapiro, however, portrayed Odgren as a victim of bullying by other students.

"None of the prior incidents were anything more than very, very minor disputes, mainly because he was bullied unmercifully," Shapiro said.

Odgren's trial is scheduled to begin on Sept. 15.

(Copyright 2008 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)