Monday, February 7, 2005

D.A. BROWN: THREE 19-YEAR-OLD STUDENTS INDICTED ON GANG ASSAULT CHARGES IN STABBING OF 15-YEAR-OLD STUDENT AT SPRINGFIELD GARDENS HIGH SCHOOL

Queens District Attorney Richard A. Brown announced today that three 19-year-old students have been indicted on gang assault and other charges in a vicious stabbing in December 2004 of a 15-year-old fellow student at Springfield Gardens High School in Southeast Queens.

District Attorney Brown said, “The defendants have been charged with intentionally assaulting a fellow student during school hours by surrounding him and stabbing him three times causing nerve damage.”

The District Attorney identified the defendants, all residents of Queens, as: (1)Gavin McFarlane of 146-19 223rd Street;(2) Martain Miller of 121-27 192nd Street and (3)Andrew Maxwell of 137-42 Westgate Street, all 19 and Springfield Gardens High School students at the time of the incident. The defendants have been charged in a five-count indictment with Assault in the First Degree, Gang Assault in the First and Second Degree, Criminal Possession of a Weapon in the Fourth Degree and Endangering the Welfare of a Child and face up to 25 years in prison if convicted.

According to District Attorney Brown, the indictment charges that the incident took place on December 3, 2004 at about 10:50 a.m. in a foyer inside Springfield Gardens High School at 143-10 Springfield Gardens Boulevard in Springfield Gardens, Queens.

It is alleged that the defendants while acting together surrounded the victim, Kemar Folkes, 15, and threatened him with a kitchen knife. It is additionally alleged that defendant McFarlane blocked the foyer door and refused to open it while defendant Maxwell stabbed the victim twice in the left shoulder and once in the left side while defendant Miller offered verbal encouragement. It is further alleged that the victim sustained two stab wounds to his shoulder and a severed nerve in his left side causing him partial loss of feeling and weakness in his left leg and substantial pain.

The District Attorney said that police apprehended the defendants shortly after the incident.

Defendant McFarlane is awaiting arraignment later today in Queens Supreme Court and defendants Miller and Maxwell are to be arraigned at a later date.

The investigation was conducted by Detective Steven Deluca of the New York City Police Department’s 113th Detective Squad under the supervision of Lieutenant Michelle Kaiser and the overall supervision of Assistant Chief Charles F. Gunther, Jr., Commanding Officer, Detective Borough Queens, and Chief of Detectives George F. Brown.

The case is being prosecuted by Assistant District Attorney Michael E. Brovner of the District Attorney’s Gang Violence and Hate Crimes Bureau under the supervision of Assistant District Attorneys Mariela Palomino Herring, Bureau Chief, Robert J. Hanophy Jr., Deputy Bureau Chief, and Charles N. Walsh, Senior Trial Attorney, and the overall supervision of Executive Assistant District Attorney for Trials James Clark Quinn and Deputy Executive Assistant District Attorney for Trials John H. Larsen.

It should be noted that an indictment is merely an accusation and that defendants are presumed innocent until proven guilty.