Probation revoked for Las Vegas teen caught with gun after manslaughter release
A week after the county stalled in finding a community placement for a 16-year-old boy who was recently paroled in the shooting death of another teenager, a family court judge revoked his probation and sent him back to a youth correctional facility.
On Wednesday, Judge Dee Butler said she had decided the boy’s punishment before hearing arguments from his attorneys and prosecutors.
The boy, whom the Las Vegas Review-Journal is not identifying because he was not tried as an adult, stared blankly for most of the proceeding.
He was initially taken into custody after police identified him as the shooter in the Oct. 16 killing of 17-year-old Keanu Enright. Officers booked the teen, who was 15 then, on suspicion of open murder, but the charge was reduced to involuntary manslaughter after prosecutors could not prove intent.
The youth offender then spent several months in detention before he was released on parole after having completed rehabilitation requirements.
Eleven days later, the teen, who is a ward of the state, was arrested again on a second petition, a misdemeanor firearm possession charge. The teen later admitted that while in foster care, he had a BB gun and violated his probation. His disposition hearing was postponed multiple times because Clark County Family Services struggled to develop a supervision plan if he were released.
One of the teen’s attorneys, Laila-Rose Hudson, argued that the judge’s decision would mark the boy’s future.
“We are well on our way from the foster care to prison pipeline with this youth,” Hudson told Butler. “And if you’re institutionalizing him at this point, it will just cement that fact.”
Butler said that the decision to recommit the boy was for his safety and that of the community.
“What I want to happen this time is that (the teen) is brought back to court either immediately before release or immediately after release. Because, as we’ve heard, there is no plan with CCFS. There is no placement,” Butler said. “I do not want a child to go to a youth correctional facility again, and we’re right back here before he has the opportunity to receive parole services.”
Contact Akiya Dillon at adillon@reviewjournal.com.