Boy, 10, is charged as an adult with homicide in death of woman, 90
A 10-year-old boy has been charged as an adult with homicide in the death of a 90-year-old Pennsylvania woman.
Authorities said the child told state police that he killed Helen Novak during a visit to his grandfather in the Honesdale area on Saturday, at a home in which the victim also resided, according to Civitas Media and the Scranton Times-Tribune.
However, the boy told police he was only trying to hurt Novak, not kill her, when he held her cane to her throat and punched her.
The boy has been held at the Wayne County prison without bail since his arrest Saturday. On Wednesday, the boy’s attorney, Bernard Brown, withdrew a petition to have his client released into his father’s care or removed to a juvenile detention facility, the Times Herald-Record reported. Brown said the family was not comfortable with having him released into their care right now, and noted the nearest juvenile detention facility is 80 miles away, making family visits inconvenient.
Brown said that the boy is being housed alone in a cell, away from the general population and being given coloring books and other recreational opportunities.
The Associated Press and KFOR say the alleged attack was sparked when the boy went into Novak’s room and she yelled at him. When the boy’s grandfather checked on her shortly after the alleged attack, Novak told him she was fine, but when he went back later, she was unresponsive, according to the AP.
Because there is no provision in state law for charging a juvenile with homicide, the boy had to be charged as an adult, the Wayne County prosecutor’s office said. District Attorney Janine Edwards had asked the state attorney general’s office to take over the case because one of her staffers is a relative of the defendant, the Scranton Times-Tribune reported. Edwards has not received a response from the AG, however, so she is proceeding as lead prosecutor.
Brown planned to ask the court Friday to move the case to juvenile court, the Times-Tribune reported.
Updated Oct. 16 to include information from the Times Record-Herald and additional coverage from the Times-Tribune.
