The teenager was allowed to plead no contest to ethnic intimidation
and the prosecutors dropped the charge of fifth degree aggravated menacing.
Cantu said that the boy and his friends said that they were gong to lynch him until a stranger intervened.
His family says it plans to sue the city for good reason. It is not clear why the charges in the case were so low and then pleaded out to such a meaningless penalty. This is an 18-year-old not some toddler. Anyone who would commit such an act is an obviously unbalanced individual and a danger to society.
No charges appear to have been brought against the other participating teenagers.
The city’s website proclaims “[i]n 1965 Look Magazine named Mount Vernon an ” All American City” and the city maintains the standards that resulted in this acclaim. In 1994 Mount Vernon was named “Ohio’s Most Livable Community” by Ohio Magazine.”