Long Beach teens get probation in hate-crime case

It's only a hate crime if it's inflicted on a minority dontcha know.

LONG BEACH – Angering one victim's family, a judge yesterday sentenced four black youths to probation with 60 days of home detention in the racially motivated Halloween beatings of three white women.

The sentences by Juvenile Court Judge Gibson Lee touched off another series of bitter words in a case that seems to spark outrage at every step. For the past few months, it has tested the harmony of this coastal city of 475,000, which touts its diversity.

“The juvenile system is a joke,” said Barbara Schneider, as her 19-year-old daughter, Laura, sobbed on her shoulder. Her comments outside court came after Lee passed sentence on the only male defendant of the nine youths convicted last week in the attack. The defendant is 18, but was 17 on Halloween. Prosecutors contended that he was the most culpable of all the convicted defendants.