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CROWN POINT, Ind. -- A 14-year-old Hammond boy sentenced to 5 1/2 years in prison for killing a neighbor will soon become Indiana's youngest prison inmate.

Leobardo Nunez Jr., was sentenced Friday by a judge who said everyone -- including Hammond schools and the social services safety net -- failed to stop him from becoming a bully who hung with a street gang that supplied him with the fatal weapon.

But Lake County Criminal Court Judge Salvador Vasquez refused to let Nunez walk away from court without prison time for the killing of 23-year-old Daniel Skonicki.

"Probation is not appropriate," he said before announcing the sentence.

Pam Pattison, a spokeswoman for the Indiana Department of Correction, said Friday that Nunez will displace a Grant County girl who just turned 15 as the youngest person serving adult time in Indiana.

She said Nunez probably will be assigned to a special section of the Wabash Valley Correctional Facility in southern Indiana, where he will be shielded from the general adult population and given educational opportunities and counseling.

He could be eligible for parole in less than two years and then would serve 18 months of probation.

Nunez's mother, Angelica Negron, pleaded Friday for her son to be released on probation, arguing that he would come out of prison a hardened criminal.

The victim's mother, Mary Skonicki, demanded life imprisonment and said her son helped the family financially and helped raise his younger sister, Kerry Ann Skonicki, who also testified.

"My brother taught me how to play baseball. He wouldn't let anything bad happen to me. Now I've lost him," the sister said.

Nunez pleaded guilty last month to reckless homicide to avoid a longer sentence.

Police said Nunez was hanging out on Oct. 18, 2003, in an alley near Skonicki's home in Hammond, reportedly with members of the Spanish Gangster Disciples.

Someone then handed Nunez a gun just before Skonicki and another man walked up.

After one of the gang members attacked Skonicki, Nunez said he fired three shots, intending to scare Skonicki, who was struck twice in the chest and died a few hours later.

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