Parents of accused middle-school killer: Our son is not a monster

When Kathy and Manny Hernandez saw the pages of their son's jumbled journal -- with descriptions of violent acts and plans to kill family and friends written in a frenzied, almost incomprehensible scrawl -- it was one of the first tangible glimpses they had of a Michael they say they had no idea existed.

''To me, it's so confusing,'' said Manny Hernandez, referring to his son's journal during an interview Tuesday at the family's Palmetto Bay home. ``It's here. It's there. . .It had no focus. We didn't even know he had a journal. If we had seen it, we probably would have told him `Michael, clean this up so it would be legible or something.'''

Scattered and unfocused weren't words either of his parents would have used to describe 14-year-old Michael Hernandez.

His mother, Kathy Hernandez, had often described her son as highly focused.

''He's a very organized person,'' she said. ``I used to say he would be really good in the military, because he likes things like he likes them. He likes his routine.''

Like many of the things she's learned about her son since investigators charged him three months ago with first-degree murder of a Southwood Middle School classmate, Kathy Hernandez has a hard time reconciling the boy who wrote the journal and the son she knows.

''I don't understand it,'' she said.

NOT A MONSTER

After months of watching their son's psyche dissected in the media, the Hernandezes have embarked this week on a round of press interviews. Their message: Their son is not a monster; he's a child.

Michael calls home every day from the Dade County Jail. His parents see him twice a week now. They shout at each other on opposite sides of a thick plate glass. They get one ''contact visit'' a month.

They're not really sure how he's doing, Kathy Hernandez said.

''He's just flat. He's just not the same child that we knew,'' said Kathy Hernandez, voice trailing off.

Later she said slowly: ``If he did this, it speaks of a very disturbed mind that we don't know. This was not the Michael we knew.''

The Michael they know made good grades, has a deep belief in God and rarely found his way into trouble, they say.

''He's bright, he's articulate, he's inquisitive. He has a wonderful sense of humor, a very likable boy, great speller, very interested in world affairs; he can talk about almost any topic,'' said his mother.

Prosecutors say the highly intelligent eighth-grader methodically plotted out the slaying of his friend and classmate, Jaime Gough, also 14, in a bathroom at Southwood Middle School. They say Michael wrote Jaime's name and the name of another classmate on a ''hit list'' he kept in his journal. Also on the list: his older sister, Christina, 20, a college student.

Christina Hernandez was the one topic the Hernandezes didn't want to discuss in depth.

''I would really like for his sister to be left out of this,'' Kathy Hernandez said.

She described the relationship between the two as ``normal. . . . We go on vacation together and they fought. . . . They fought over who was going to say the blessing at night. They fought over if one went in the other's room. That type of thing.''

Looking back, nothing seems abnormal about their son, the Hernandezes said.

''It just doesn't seem possible,'' said Manny Hernandez. ``Not the son that we raised and nurtured and had dinners with every single Saturday night. We're a very routine family. We have pizza on Thursdays, we do grocery shopping at Publix and go to dinner on Saturdays.''

JAMIE'S SLAYING

The parents recalled the weekend before Jaime's slaying on Feb. 3. They stuck to a family routine of celebrating birthdays that fell during the week with a dinner at a restaurant on Saturday.

Michael Hernandez's 14th birthday fell on a Monday, Feb. 2. That Saturday, Michael didn't want to go out. He wanted to eat Taco Bell at home, so that's what the family did. On his birthday, investigators say Michael brought a knife to school to kill Jaime and another classmate, but the plan fell apart.

After school, Michael went home and received birthday gifts of money, a silver bracelet, fitness magazines and some cologne.

Manny Hernandez said he couldn't remember anything unusual about that night or the next morning, when Jaime was killed. He sent Michael off to school after making the boy's favorite lunch.

The next time the Hernandezes saw their son was about 5 p.m. -- at a police station being questioned about Jaime's slaying.

They said their son had only one thing to say when he saw them: 'He said `I didn't do it. I didn't do it' and he bowed his head down,'' his father said.

They say the police were never told them he was a suspect. They found out from a newspaper reporter that detectives had said their son had confessed. ''It's still shocking to us. . .It's a never-ending nightmare,'' Manny Hernandez said. They know everyone has the same question: Didn't you see any signs that your son might have a troubled mind?

''We wonder all the time,'' Kathy Hernandez said. ``What did we miss? What should we have seen? Should we have seen anything? Michael was doing well in school. By all accounts, he seemed happy.''

They can't help second-guessing themselves when they look back. And they don't look too far into the future. They take things one day at a time.

''It's hard to do it any other way,'' Manny Hernandez said. ``We don't know. Everything is out of our hands. . .

``I feel terrible. . .for Jaime and his family. . .for all the parents at Southwood. It's totally devastating to us.''