A judge in northeastern Washington has sentenced an 11-year-old boy to three to four years in juvenile detention for plotting to kill a girl in his fifth-grade class.
The boy was convicted last month of conspiracy to commit first-degree murder.
The Spokesman-Review reported that Stevens County Superior Court Judge Allen Nielson called the boy’s actions “a brazen crime.” The judge said Wednesday he found cause for an extended sentence.
After a lengthy hearing, the judge said the boy’s actions after the plot was discovered amounted to a “shrewd effort” to pin evidence on his co-defendant, a 10-year-old male classmate who earlier pleaded guilty.
Fort Colville Elementary School staff seized a handgun, an ammunition clip and a knife from the 10-year-old’s backpack on Feb. 7. A fourth-grader saw one of the boys playing with the knife on a school bus and told a school worker.
