Monday, 4/7/97
Community Briefs
Suspect convicted in murder of UCLA alumni
An 18-year-old was convicted of first-degree murder for watching
an older friend slash a former UCLA student to death during a
robbery in Tustin on Super Bowl Sunday 1996.
Domenic Christopher, who was 17 at the time of the attack, faces
a prison term of 25 years to life. Sentencing was scheduled April
25.
Gunner Lindberg, 24, also faces trial for the first-degree
murder of Thien Minh Ly, a 24-year-old graduate of UCLA and
Georgetown University who was rollerblading on the Tustin High
School tennis court.
Lindberg is accused of actually stabbing and robbing Ly, and
prosecutors plan to request capital punishment for him.
White supremist literature was found in the apartment the two
shared; the older man was also charged with a hate crime and
robbery, but Christopher was not.
His attorney asked the jury to deliver a conviction on accessory
to murder. But juror Sue Wilmott said following Thursday’s verdict
that she and her colleagues believed Christopher was more
involved.
"We all felt terribly bad," she said. "But we figured it’s to
the point now where if you stand there and you’re involved in the
crime, you’re going to have to do the time, too," Wilmott said.
Ly graduated from UCLA in 1994 with degrees in biology and
English. According to a family member, he had hoped to one day
become an ambassador to Vietnam.
While at UCLA, Ly was president of the Vietnamese Students’
Association and director of the annual Vietnamese Students’
Association’s Culture Night.
UCLA doctors may separate twin sisters
LOS ANGELES — Doctors were evaluating whether to separate
newborn twin girls who reportedly share a malformed heart and a
liver.
The twins were in critical but stable condition on Saturday and
breathing with the aid of a ventilator, said Roxanne Moster, a
spokeswoman for the University of California, Los Angeles, Medical
Center.
"It is a complex situation that is being evaluated. They are
sharing several organs," Simi Singer, another medical center
spokeswoman, said Friday.
The medical center released no other details about the
birth.
A source at the hospital said the girls share a malformed heart,
with three ventricle chambers instead of the normal two, and also
share a liver, the Daily News of Los Angeles reported Saturday.
Conjoined twins with a similar sharing of organs were born two
years ago at Los Angeles County-USC Medical Center. They died
during separation surgery.
Legislature will discuss graduation standards
California lawmakers will consider bills to toughen high school
graduation standards when they meet in Sacramento this week.
Bills before the education committees would add more English,
math and arts courses to graduation requirements. State law now
requires students to complete three English courses, three
mathematics courses, two science courses, three social studies
courses, two physical education courses and one course in visual
arts, performing arts or foreign language.
A bill by Sen. Dede Alpert, D-Coronado would revise those
standards beginning in the 2002-2003 school year. It would add a
year of English, require the math courses to include algebra and
geometry and specify that the science courses be laboratory science
like chemistry, biology or physics. A bill by Assemblywoman Sheila
Kuehl, D-Santa Monica, takes a different approach. Beginning also
in the 2002-2003 school year, it would require one course in visual
or performing arts plus one course in foreign language.
Compiled from Daily Bruin staff and wire reports.