Stolen Boy’s Weblog

The San Jose Mercury News talked about a crime that happened eight years ago. So why is it exactly that the new prosecutor on the case wants Jesse James Hollywood dead? What’s the connection? I mean has he ever met the guy? I sorta doubt that. Could it be ego, maybe? The pride of a man, and the department that backs him, who wish to better enhance their reputations in the eye of a watchful public? Fueled by a desire to garner global attention? It’s possible. His predecessor had become a national household name. A near media sensation. And this was before he prosecuted Michael Jackson.

In the Fall of 2000, Ron Zonen pulled an impressive solo number with the Santa Barbara Grand Jury, eliciting quick and easy indictments against Hollywood and his four co-defendants. He shaped the Grand Jurors minds with his theory of the case. In one major aspect, his theory was wrong. But the case continued to garner national headlines. The murder captured a nation’s fascination with images of fifteen-year-old Nicholas’s body being discovered in a shallow grave overlooking the picturesque Santa Barbara Coast.

The distraught parents of the victim also made major headlines. Everyone in the world wanted to talk to them. They still do. And the victim’s parents talked. They talked about the pain they had suffered in losing their only child. They talked about their desire to seek justice. Tears were shed by speakers and listeners alike. It was a tragic and heartbreaking moment, and we all felt their pain. Everyone wanted justice. And in the Santa Barbara County District Attorney’s office, this meant more young men were gonna die.

When Jesse James Hollywood got captured, everyone screamed for joy. The dangerous fugitive had been taken off the streets. Now we, as Californians, possessed the right to kill him as well. Which was what the prosecutor was trying to do when I finally did get involved.

I’d read all the newspapers while doing the research for Alpha Dog and Stolen Boy. I’d read all the trial transcripts. I’d seen all the blog sites on the Internet and read all the letters to the editors. The public sentiment pretty much agreed on one important factor: Jesse James Hollywood needed to die. And he hadn’t even gone to court yet. He hadn’t been convicted of anything anywhere other than in the court of public opinion.

And I couldn’t live with that. I’d written a book about this young man. I’d helped write a screenplay and make a movie about him. At the time, I’d spent the past three years of my life trying to understand why Jesse James Hollywood was who he was. It was something that was important for me to know. It was important for Nick Cassavetes to know. It was important for the public to know. Jesse James Hollywood is a lot of things, but he is not someone who should be on death row.

When I went to hear final arguments to the California Supreme Court this past April, Mr. Glassman of the California Attorney General’s office confirmed my feelings regarding this case. He again iterated the prosecution’s position regarding the crime. He called it a revenge killing for a drug debt, which, in my opinion, amounts to a prosecutorial lie. One that I’m pretty tired of hearing and one I will continue to debunk. This is the position the prosecution has maintained ever since the beginning of this case-probably handed down to them by misguided police-and this is another reason for my involvement.

The prosecution has totally missed the boat. Yes, a young boy died. It is a sad and tragic truth. But nobody wanted him dead. Nobody wanted to be up there on that hillside in Lizard’s Mouth with him that night. Nobody wanted to be a part of it. They all liked Nick. They partied with him. And they ultimately killed him as an act of self-preservation.

They feared what Nick might say. They feared what might happen to them. They feared for their own lives. Which is one of the biggest sins a man can commit. Killing another to protect yourself. But it is also a far cry from what the prosecution would have you believe. Ron Zonen and I debated this very point, in his office. We completely disagreed with one another, and he kept on pursuing the angle that these young men were nothing more than dirty rotten scum that needed burning, and he needed to be stopped.

Mr. Zonen has since been censured for his work with me, but for very different reasons than what they could have been. He cannot return to the case. There’s too much baggage. And the new prosecutor, the man who stepped into Mr. Zonen’s hangman’s shoes, must now adhere to the wisdom of telling the truth regarding what this case is really about. It’s the only way justice will be served. And in the end, two young men’s lives just might be saved as a result thereof.