Teenager tells of friend's role after father's killing

Ricky Chavis, who took in two brothers after they killed their father, advised a claim of self-defense, one brother testifies.

©Associated Press
March 5, 2003

PENSACOLA -- A teenage killer on Tuesday disputed a defense allegation that he had misled Ricky Chavis by falsely claiming self-defense in his father's death.

Derek King, 14, testified during Chavis' trial on charges of evidence tampering and accessory after the fact to murder.

King said it was Chavis who concocted a self-defense story for him and his brother Alex.

The brothers were 13 and 12 when Derek bludgeoned Terry King, 40, to death with a baseball bat at Alex's urging on Nov. 26, 2001, at their home in nearby Cantonment. The victim was attacked as he slept in a recliner. The boys then set the house on fire to destroy evidence.

Chavis is accused of taking the boys, who called from a nearby convenience store, to his Pensacola home, washing their clothes and hiding them from police before turning them in the next day.

"He told us it would be better if we pleaded self-defense to this," Derek testified.

Investigators quickly shot down the self-defense claim by telling the boys that evidence from the scene made it clear their father never put up a fight. The boys then confessed.

Both the prosecution and the defense rested later Tuesday. The case will go to the six-member jury after closing arguments today. The boys previously have said they thought their father was too strict and they wanted to live with Chavis, who had let them smoke marijuana, play video games and watch television late into the night when they ran away from home 10 days before the killing. Alex also claimed Chavis was his lover.

Defense lawyer Michael Rollo said in his opening statement that Derek told Chavis the boys killed their father to protect Alex from him. Chavis harbored the young fugitives as an act of compassion, keeping them only until Alex, who was in shock and "catatonic," calmed down, Rollo said.

He offered what is known as a "necessity defense." In such cases, crimes can sometimes be excused if committed to prevent a greater harm.

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