One Cut

April 15, 2017
Porinchak recounts how the legal system fails five teens who commit a serious crime. The May 22, 1995, brawl in a white suburb of Los Angeles that resulted in the death of one teen and the injury of another is related matter-of-factly. The account of the police investigation, the judicial process, and the ultimate incarceration of the five boys is more passionately argued. Since the story focuses on the teens' experiences following the brawl, minimal attention is given to Jimmy Farris, who died, although the testimony of Mike McLoren, who survived, is crucial. The book opens with a comprehensive dramatis personae that will help orient readers, and the text is liberally punctuated by quotes drawn from contemporary newspaper and magazine coverage as well as interviews with several of the key figures, including three of the accused. Porinchak argues that the proceedings were influenced by the high-profile 1994 trial and acquittal of the Menendez brothers, and unfounded accusations of gang involvement further clouded the matter. Despite the journalistic style, there is clear intent to elicit sympathy for the five boys involved, three of whom were sentenced to life without parole; of two, the text remarks that "they were numbers now, not humans." This is clearly not unbiased reporting, but it makes a strong case that justice in our legal system does not always fit the crime. (Nonfiction. 14-18)

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June 1, 2017

Gr 8 Up-On May 22, 1995, teenagers Jimmy Farris and Mike McLoren were hanging out in McLoren's backyard when four other boys from their high school-Jason and Micah Holland, Tony Miliotti, and Brandon Hein-hopped the fence onto the McLoren property. Twenty minutes later, Farris lay dead in the McLoren kitchen from multiple stab wounds, while McLoren was taken to the hospital for cuts. The once quiet community of Agoura Hills, CA, was shattered by Farris's death, and the ensuing media circus did nothing to help the images of the five boys arrested (another, Chris Velardo, who wasn't present at the scene of the crime was also locked up). The prosecution built its case on flimsy eyewitness accounts and blatant hearsay, and at the end of the lengthy trial, four out of the five boys were convicted of first-degree murder. Porinchak carefully exposes some of the failings of the trial, including the biased presiding judge and the selection of jurors who personally knew the victims' families. The narrative keeps the details of what really happened vague, adding to the mystery of the case. Ultimately, this is a story of how four lives were forever disrupted because of prejudice and a flawed judicial system. VERDICT A solid purchase for teen collections where true crime is popular; an additional purchase otherwise.-Tyler Hixson, School Library Journal

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