Teen murder defendant is charged in second plot

A 14-year-old boy accused in the brutal slaying of a middle school classmate six months ago has now been charged with plotting to kill a second student, Miami-Dade prosecutors said Monday.

Michael Hernandez, charged with first-degree murder in the Feb. 3 slashing death of Jaime Gough, faces a premeditated attempted murder charge as well.

The new accusation is rooted in the teen's own words: his confession to homicide detectives that a day before the murder he tried to kill another classmate, along with incriminating entries in a journal.

''These new charges were filed because evidence indicated an additional crime had been committed, which made filing such a charge appropriate,'' said Ed Griffith, spokesman for the Miami-Dade state attorney's office.

Griffith declined to comment on why it took prosecutors so long, since details of the plot came to light soon after Hernandez's arrest.

Hernandez's attorney, his mother and her lawyer called the new charge ''piling on'' by prosecutors and a way ``to break down the family financially and emotionally.''

''It's very atypical for prosecutors to wait this long to file new charges in a case,'' said Richard Rosenbaum, who is representing Hernandez in the Gough case. ``It sounds like they're piling on. They have no new information in this case.''

Michael Hursey, the attorney representing Hernandez's parents, held a news conference in Fort Lauderdale to echo that sentiment.

''We are really displeased,'' said Hursey, who once represented the mother of Lionel Tate, another South Florida teen accused of murder. ``The family is distraught and already reeling from the first charge. To have to go through another arraignment and open wounds is a terrible thing for them.

``This takes the roof off.''

The teen's mother, Kathy Hernandez, said she was ''devastated'' by the timing of the new charge.

''I couldn't believe it,'' she said. ``Why now?''

Hursey said the timing blindsided the defense team and that the Hernandezes are considering hiring another attorney because the case has not been consolidated with the initial murder charge.

''The judicial system is about money,'' Kathy Hernandez said. ``We are working, middle-class people.''

She said she visits Michael in jail every other week, adding that the family no longer discusses the murder case with him.

''Michael is in his own reality,'' she said.

Rosenbaum said his only hint that prosecutors planned more charges against his client came five months ago when pages of Hernandez's journal were released to the media and the second intended victim's name was mistakenly revealed.

''At the time, the reason they gave for asking the name be kept secret was because they were looking into filing additional charges, but that was five months ago,'' Rosenbaum said. The intended victim is referred to in court documents by the initials A.M.

A page in Hernandez's journal titled ''Planning'' indicated he wanted to stab A.M. first, then Gough. He wanted to pose their bodies on one of the toilets at Southwood Middle School in Palmetto Bay.

In a videotaped confession to detectives, Hernandez said: ``My intentions yesterday were to kill A. I was going to stab him in the back and stab here, and that would have been it.''

In court papers filed Friday, Assistant State Attorney Carin Kahgan said that a day before the murder, Hernandez, armed with a knife, attempted to kill by ''inviting, arranging or luring A.M.'' to enter a bathroom stall. The intended victim did not cooperate.

Hernandez is set for a new arraignment on Aug. 20 -- a day after a judge is to begin hearing testimony on whether the teen is mentally competent to stand trial.

Hernandez is being tried as an adult. If convicted of first-degree murder, he faces a mandatory life sentence.