BALTIMORE — As part of a plea agreement, two teenage girls admitted yesterday to taking part in a severe beating of a 12-year-old girl earlier this year at a birthday party.
The 14-year-old and the 13-year-old pleaded guilty in juvenile court to two counts of second-degree assault in exchange for prosecutors dropping charges of attempted murder, first-degree assault and reckless endangerment, said Roland Walker, an attorney for the older of the two defendants.
Authorities say the girls were part of a Feb. 28 attack in which Nicole Townes was pummeled, stomped and scratched until her body went limp. Nicole was in a coma for three weeks and authorities believe she suffered brain damage.
Mr. Walker said the state took into account the defendants’ ages and that their roles in the attack on Nicole was “collateral.”
“I think the charges are very serious. The circumstances surrounding this case are extreme and certainly disturbing,” Mr. Walker said. “But when you look at the roles of these two, compared to some of the others in the case and you look at the backgrounds of these two, yes, it’s a fair, sensible result.”
Juvenile court Judge Edward R.K. Hargadon and a spokesman for the city prosecutor’s office declined to comment after the pleas were entered.
Another 13-year-old girl, a 15-year-old and two women also were charged in the assault, and police charged a 24-year-old woman who lived with Nicole with child abuse and neglect for leaving the girl at the party.
The girls who entered pleas yesterday were released to stay with their families, on an electronic monitoring system, until their May 26 sentencing.
Police and prosecutors said Nicole was beaten after a boy at the party, acting on a dare, kissed her on the cheek. The mother of the birthday girl apparently was offended because the boy was supposed to be her daughter’s boyfriend. Prosecutors said the mother urged her daughter to “handle your business,” an order police said meant the girl was supposed to defend the family’s honor.
Nicole was attacked by as many as six women and girls, police said. The birthday girl and her 36-year-old mother were among those charged.
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