Slaying is town’s worst nightmare

Published 9:42 pm Thursday, June 18, 2009

SULTAN — The brutal beating and stabbing of a Marysville teen and the arrests of five Sultan teenagers in connection with the boy’s death was exactly what Sultan city officials have been trying to avoid.

Antonio Marks, 17, was attacked in the middle of downtown Sultan early Wednesday morning. A video surveillance camera caught the beating and stabbing on tape. It shows Marks being approached by five young people. A punch to the face knocked him to the ground. He was repeatedly pummeled and kicked in the head, according to court papers.

He never fought back.

The teen’s death, on Main Street just feet from City Hall, has saddened Sultan leaders who hoped they’d done enough to keep young people safe.

“I think we’re in the same boat as any other community,” said Snohomish County sheriff’s Lt. Jeff Brand, who serves as Sultan’s police chief. “There’s really no Mayberry anymore.”

Detectives said Marco Castillo, 19, pulled a knife from his pocket and stabbed Marks several times in the torso, according to court documents filed Thursday in Everett District Court.

Castillo and four other teenagers ran from the scene, leaving a beaten and bleeding Marks lying in the middle of the street, according investigators. Marks died at a Seattle hospital from injuries to his head and stab wounds to his torso, according to the Snohomish County Medical Examiner’s Office.

It wasn’t clear Thursday why Marks was in Sultan. He attended the Northwest Regional Learning Center in downtown Everett from January until May. The center serves a mix of students, including many, Marks included, who have had brushes with the juvenile court system.

“We saw a side of him that showed potential,” said Cathy Hawes, the school’s director. She called his death a tragedy.

“Antonio had a really big heart,” Hawes said. “He would often help other students. He was a really good athlete and he had some talents as a writer. He would write some poetry.”

Detectives arrested Castillo, his brother, 16, another boy, 16, and two girls – one 16 and another 17 — for investigation of second-degree murder. The juvenile defendants’ names weren’t released Thursday. Prosecutors expect to charge all of them as adults.

Castillo, who was being held on $1 million bail, allegedly told detectives he had a dispute with Marks on Tuesday. He saw him again Wednesday while Castillo was walking back from a store. Castillo allegedly told investigators he didn’t intend to kill Marks but wanted to hurt him enough so the younger boy wouldn’t be able to retaliate, according to court documents.

“This murder is especially vicious,” Snohomish County deputy prosecutor Kathy Jo Blake told the judge in asking for the high bail for Castillo.

Officials have not said if Wednesday’s attack was gang-related or if the suspects or the victim have gang ties.

Court documents show at least one of the suspects last month told a probation counselor he is affiliated with a Sultan-based gang known as the Brown Pride Soldiers, or BPS for short. The sheriff’s office has identified about 10 people in Sultan who claim to be members of BPS, Brand said.

One other gang — it calls itself the Gold Bar Crips — also has been identified in the Skykomish Valley. Officials said members of that gang were responsible for extorting money from students who wanted to use a popular walking trail leading to the high school. One boy who refused to pay the 50-cent toll was beaten up. The city closed down the trail.

Gang experts say more gang members are turning up in rural communities across the nation, along with an increase in young people emulating the thug lifestyle. Gang members and associates have been identified in every city in Snohomish County.

Lately, Dave Wood has noticed big-city problems filtering into this town of 4,500. Wood is the director of services for the Western Washington Sky Valley Community Resource Center.

“Gangs used to be in big cities. But now you see the culture and the ideas spreading to small towns,” Wood said.

That may be deliberate on the part of gangs, who might perceive the police force in a smaller town as easier to deal with than a big city force, Woods said. The town is one convenient stop on U.S. 2, a major east-west route for drug dealers, he said.

“My fear is we’d get to the point that somebody would get killed,” Wood said. “Well, it happened.”

City and school officials, along with youth advocates and church leaders, have worked with the sheriff’s office to address Sultan’s youth problems, including gangs, for a couple of years.

Just a few weeks ago officials met to talk about what more they can do to provide positive role models and activities to help keep young people out of trouble, Brand said.

“Maybe this will be a catalyst for the community to push forward to come up with more programs for kids,” he said.

Part of the problem may be a lot of unsupervised kids. A study in Sultan found nearly three-quarters of the parents in town work elsewhere, Wood said.

“They get in their cars at 6:30 (in the morning) and they might not be back until 6:30 or 8:30 at night,” he said. “We’ve pretty much created a community of latchkey kids.”

Mayor Carolyn Eslick noticed a problem about a half-dozen years ago. She said two years ago it was common to see upward of 30 kids, some as young as 12, hanging around on the corner near City Hall. The spot is close to a bus stop and kids could meet their friends coming from other towns. Meanwhile, transients in Sultan were buying cigarettes, drugs and alcohol for the teens, she said. The city experienced an uptick in burglaries and vandalism about the same time, she said.

That’s gotten better with the opening of an alternative high school that put some kids back in the classroom. Police also placed more emphasis on talking with kids, Eslick said.

“We aren’t going to let them get away with the pranks and behavior anymore,” she said. “I’ve asked the police to watch them closer.”

The mayor said she was saddened by the stabbing, which happened a few feet from her office.

“I didn’t know the young man but it’s very disturbing to me that it happened right outside my window,” she said.

Community leaders have worked hard to make sure kids have safe places to be, especially on Friday and Saturday nights, Eslick said. Kids can hang out at the Boys and Girls Club, compete in video game tournaments at the library or attend dances and other activities at Safe Stop, a program for teens on Saturday nights at the middle school. The town built a BMX bike trail at Osprey Park and a skate park.

“We have a lot of things to do in town but it depends on if they choose to do it,” Eslick said.

The community plans a meeting for the town to discuss the killing and the arrests. It’s set for 7 p.m. Tuesday at the Volunteers of America Sky Valley Resource Center, 701 First St.

“I’m sad for families of these boys and the victim,” Eslick said. “All we can do in our community is keep moving in the right direction.”

Herald reporter Eric Stevick contributed to this report.

Diana Hefley: 425-339-3463, hefley@heraldnet.com.

Meeting planned

A community meeting to discuss Wednesday’s stabbing death of a teen in Sultan is scheduled for 7 p.m. Tuesday at the Volunteers of America Sky Valley Resource Center, 701 First St.