Boy, 12, Charged as Adult in Playground Stabbing of 9-Year-Old as Community Struggles to Understand Tragedy

A 12-year-old western Michigan who fatally stabbed a 9-year-old boy Monday has been charged as an adult, and is the youngest person ever in Kent County to be charged with murder, according to media reports.

The suspect, who authorities have identified as Jamarion Lawhorn, has pleaded not guilty to the charges in family court and is undergoing a mental health evaluation, WJBK, Channel 2, reports.

Investigators are looking into the 12-year-old’s background, but said he doesn’t have a juvenile record, MLive/The Grand Rapids Press reports. Police have no indication of a disagreement between the four boys who were playing at the Kentwood mobile home park playground about 6 p.m Monday when Jamarion pulled out a knife and stabbed Michael Connor Verkerke multiple times.

Though Kent County authorities have never charged anyone younger with murder, he’s not the youngest Michigander to be charged. In 1997, Nathaniel Abraham, then 11, was convicted of shooting an 18-year-old in Oakland County.

Monday’s crime has left residents of Kentwood, a city of about 50,000 located on the outskirts of Grand Rapids, struggling to understand how one child could viciously kill another, Detroit Free Press columnist Jeff Seidel wrote in an op-ed Thursday.

Neighbors gathered round the Pinebrook Village mobile home park wondered aloud about the effects of exposure to violent videos and movies, a still weak economy that requires parents to juggle multiple jobs and robs them of quality time with their children, and other factors that would help them understand the killing.

“They are not loving them the way they are supposed to ...,” Kelsey Beukema told Seidel.

Buekema said she saw the boys playing and her immediate reaction when she saw Jamarion, who was walking his bike, join the group was that “he doesn’t belong there.”

“I saw the kid who did the stabbing, and he had this look on his face that was really creepy,” Buekema said. “The only way that I can describe the look on his face is when you see a cheetah that is getting ready to pounce.”

Bleeding from stab wounds, Connor’s younger brother, Cameron, helped him to his nearby residence, where he collapsed on the porch. He died later at a nearby hospital.

A Boy Scout describes as “a doll of a kid,” he put his family first and reassured his brother with his last breaths, his great-uncle Jim Stearns said.

“One of his last words … was to his brother, who helped him get home … ‘If anything happens to me, it’s not your fault. I’ll always love you.’ That’s the Connor I know,” Stearns said.

He told MLive/The Grand Rapids Press Connor’s family have compassion for Jamarion and his family.

“Their hearts go out to the family of the young boy,” he said. “Even though we’re dealing with a different type of pain, they’ll be dealing with a similar pain every day for the rest of their lives. That’s not to be taken lightly.”

After the attack, Jamarion ran to nearby neighbors asking to use a phone. Glen Stacy, who was working nearby in his yard, if he could use his phone. Stacy said he assumed the boy was going to call his mother, but instead dialed 911 and calmly told the dispatcher, “I’ve just stabbed somebody. Please pick me up.”

He also said that he didn’t want to live and that he felt as if no one loved him.

Jamarion’s friends are stunned, too. Seidel interviewed one of the boy’s friends, Gavin Jackson-Merritt, also 12, who said Jamarion was “just cool” and had never been known to be violent or do drugs.

“He doesn’t really get angry or do drugs or do anything violent,” Gavin told Seidel. “ If we did have a problem … he wouldn’t get angry. We’d talk and work it out.”

A memorial fund established on GoFundMe to help Connor’s family pay funeral expenses has raised about $16,400 in just a day.

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PHOTO: A memorial is shaping up at the playground at the Pinebrook Village mobile home park in Kenwood, where 9-year-old Michael Connor Verkerke was fatally stabbed by a 12-year-old Monday.