Yellow Pages
MOUNT VERNON — A Skagit County judge needs more time to decide whether the second-degree manslaughter conviction she handed down to a 15-year-old Concrete boy for killing a hiker he mistook for a bear should carry a firearms enhancement.
Superior Court Judge Susan Cook found the boy guilty of second-degree manslaughter in early June. The boy, then 14, shot and killed 54-year-old Pamela Almli on Sauk Mountain on Aug. 2.
He was originally charged with first-degree manslaughter with a firearm enhancement. But Cook said the lesser charge was more fitting.
The boy’s attorney, Roy Howson, argued in Superior Court Wednesday that when the original charge was dismissed at trial, so was the firearms enhancement.
Howson said the judge does not have the authority to tack on the enhancement unless the prosecutor officially files it with the court. The enhancement could add six months of time onto the teen’s sentence.
“I’m still puzzling over this one,” Cook said.
She said she would make a decision before the sentencing hearing July 10.
