A Las Vegas mom has said she is horrified that her son’s killers were able to secure a plea deal with prosecutors that allows them to plead guilty to a manslaughter charge and serve their sentences in a juvenile detention center. Melissa Ready’s son, 17-year-old Jonathan Lewis, died a week after he was attacked by a group of teens who stomped on him until he lost consciousness.
The shocking incident was caught on camera, but in January, the defendants pleaded not guilty to murder charges. Prosecutors initially sought to try the four teenagers as adults, but their attorneys said the case should be dismissed due to insufficient evidence.
Footage of the incident emerged online in March, which showed a group jumping on Lewis outside the high school and kicking him before fellow students managed to break up the fight and carry him back into the school building. Police subsequently arrested and charged 16-year-old Dontral Beaver, 16-year-old Treavion Randolph, 17-year-old Damien Hernandez, and 17-year-old Gianni Robinson.
In court, their attorneys argued that the video was not clear enough to definitively show who was responsible for Lewis’s death and that the incident was not pre-planned but a “spontaneous response.” Nevertheless, after the plea deal was agreed upon, Lewis’s mother said, “They knew he was going to die. They’re letting them get away with murder.”
At a recent pretrial conference, attorneys clarified the plea details and said all four must plead guilty to voluntary manslaughter. They did not discuss sentencing, but the usual punishment for that offense ranges from one to ten years in prison and a $10,000 fine.
Investigators discovered that the fight broke out at Rancho High School following a disagreement about headphones and a vaping device that had allegedly been stolen from one student by another. Several other students were involved in the altercation, and so far, three have pleaded guilty to voluntary manslaughter, while another two are still waiting for a decision on murder charges from the District Attorney. A tenth student has not yet been publicly identified.
Lewis died at the University Medical Center of Southern Nevada when doctors diagnosed him with “nonsurvivable brain trauma” and turned off his life support machines.