On April 9, two young teenagers in San Leandro, California, were thwarted in their attempt to steal a car. In a moment caught on video that has since gone viral, when one of the boys ran toward the car owner brandishing a gun, the car owner body-slammed him, then held him there while the boy shrieked and the other boy begged, “Let him go!”
Once the boy on the ground was released, he and the other boy fled in a small white Kia Niro. As NBC News reported, the two boys had already attempted to rob a customer (who told them he was an off-duty police officer) at gunpoint at a Chase bank in San Leandro six hours earlier. When that attempt failed, they likewise fled the scene.
Video of the body-slam incident quickly made the rounds online:
Well that didn’t go as planned… pic.twitter.com/mHnAuRxLc0
— DJ Kam Bennett (@KameronBennett) April 17, 2021
The two boys in the incident joined others to continue the attempted crime spree.
“On Tuesday, April 13, three of the suspects were arrested in the Kia Niro by Oakland police on suspicion of armed robbery and were then released to their guardians,” NBC reported. “That did not prove to be a deterrent to these juveniles, who police said added a fourth juvenile for an attempt of another carjacking Friday in San Leandro in the 200 block of Begier Avenue that resulted in their arrest.”
All four boys were between the ages of 11 and 14.
San Leandro is located adjacent to Oakland, on the eastern shore of San Francisco Bay.
California Legislature’s Analyst Office (LAO) states of its juvenile crime policy:
Following the arrest of a juvenile offender, a law enforcement officer has the discretion to release the juvenile to his or her parents, or take the offender to juvenile hall. The county probation department, the agency responsible for the juvenile hall, has the discretion to accept and “book” the offender or not, in which case, the disposition of the juvenile is left to the police. Because most of the state’s juvenile halls are overcrowded, mainly with juveniles being held for violent offenses, juvenile halls may accept only the most violent arrestees, turning away most other arrestees.
If the offender is placed in juvenile hall, the probation department and/or the district attorney can choose to file a “petition” with the juvenile court, which is similar to filing charges in adult court. Or, the district attorney may request that the juvenile be “remanded” to adult court because the juvenile is “unfit” to be adjudicated as a juvenile due to the nature of his or her offense. For a juvenile who is adjudicated and whose petition is sustained (tried and convicted) in juvenile court, the offender can be placed on probation in the community, placed in a foster care or group home, incarcerated in the county’s juvenile ranch or camp, or sent to the Youth Authority as a ward of the state.