Guilty verdicts for Cramm



Sonny Thompson and Donna Stoner react after verdict is read.

By Scott North

Herald Writer

Dennis Cramm claimed he acted in self-defense when he grabbed a military-style semiautomatic rifle May 30 and repeatedly fired into a car, killing two 18-year-olds.

On Monday, a Snohomish County jury ruled it was first-degree murder.

Cramm, 18, took the news stoically, clenching his jaw, looking at the floor and shedding no tears. Under state sentencing guidelines, he faces anywhere from 32 1/2 to 40 years in prison.

The verdicts brought a measure of relief to the families of Jason Thompson and Jesse Stoner, the young men who had gone to Cramm's home to watch a fistfight, but instead wound up fatally shot.

The parents of the slain teens held each other close as the verdicts were announced.

Sonny and Mary Thompson sobbed and grasped hands with friends and relatives. Ken and Donna Stoner quietly embraced.

After Dennis Cramm was led from the courtroom, one of the first things Donna Stoner did was approach Jacque Cramm, the mother of the young man who killed her son. She enfolded her in a tearful hug.

"She's been going through hell," Donna Stoner said. "She really has."

Sonny Thompson, who wore his son's letterman's jacket, wept as he thanked jurors. He said he wore the jacket because "I wanted people to see what kind of kid he was. He wasn't like the convicted murderer. He was a good kid."

What's next

Dennis Cramm is scheduled to be sentenced March 29 by Snohomish County Superior Court Judge Linda Krese.

Prosecutors say he faces up to 40 years in prison after being convicted of two counts of first-degree murder and one count of being a felon in possession of a firearm.

Jason Thompson was a popular athlete at Mariner High School, and at the time of his death was one week away from graduation at ACES, the Mukilteo School District's alternative high school. Jesse Stoner, who'd been voted class clown that year at Mariner, was a rapper who talked of one day becoming a firefighter and planned to finish his education on his own schedule.

Cramm was a junior at Mariner who generally got good grades and was a pitcher on the high school baseball team. But there was another side. He testified about using and selling marijuana and other drugs. He said the drug dealing was not only condoned, but protected and supported by his father, Dale Cramm, 45.

Cramm's mother was no longer living in the family's south Everett home when Dale Cramm arranged for his son to have a fistfight to settle a grudge with another teen who had stolen some marijuana, the younger Cramm testified.

Jurors heard how people at the Cramm home, directed by the defendant's father, prepared for the fight by loading up rifles, a shotgun and pistols and placing them close at hand.

Accounts differ, but most witnesses agreed that Cramm and the other teen grappled for several minutes before fighting broke out among others at the scene. It quickly escalated into gunfire.

Stoner and Thompson were unarmed and simply trying to get away when they were gunned down, jurors were told.

Dennis Cramm testified that he grabbed an SKS semiautomatic rifle owned by his father and repeatedly fired it into the car carrying Stoner and Thompson. He claimed to be shooting in the direction of a man who moments earlier had pointed a handgun toward Dale Cramm, forcing his father to beg for his life.

It was Dennis Cramm's own testimony about how he used the SKS that led to his conviction, said juror Rick Medved, 30, a software developer from Lynnwood.

Cramm knew, or should have known, that repeatedly shooting into a car put lives at risk "whether he knew there were innocent victims in the car or not," Medved said.

Prosecutors charged Cramm under a sparsely used law that allows somebody to be convicted of first-degree murder if they kill by engaging in conduct that shows "extreme indifference to human life." Unlike most first-degree murder charges, the extreme indifference theory does not require the killing to be premeditated. Prosecutors merely needed to show the defendant killed somebody while engaging "in conduct which creates a grave risk of death to any person."

Jurors were allowed to consider convicting Cramm of the lesser offense of first-degree manslaughter, a homicide that results from criminal recklessness. But they rejected that option and also arguments that Cramm's actions were justified because he acted in defense of self or others.

Still, "It wasn't very clear cut," Medved said. "There was evidence the defendant's life was in danger."

Cramm's attorney, Royce Ferguson, said he was saddened, but not surprised. He will seek a minimum sentence for his client, who told him that "he'll just have to adjust" to a long prison term.

Ferguson said he believed Cramm's defense was weakened by the man's own father, who asserted his Fifth Amendment privilege against self-incrimination and refused to answer questions about what happened that night.

The attorney said Dale Cramm the day before had promised to "testify hard" that he had been staring down the barrel of a gun, expecting to die, when his son picked up the rifle and saved his life.

"If he would have just taken the stand and told the truth, I think it would have helped his kid," Ferguson said. Instead, "he wouldn't even come in and do that. To me, that was the biggest act of betrayal I've ever seen."

The elder Cramm earlier pleaded guilty to two drug felonies for possessing marijuana and hallucinogenic mushrooms found in his home. Jim Townsend, the county's chief criminal prosecutor, said he didn't understand why the elder Cramm felt compelled to assert his Fifth Amendment privilege.

"I don't know what the fear was," he said. "When the case initially came in, we looked very hard to see if it was possible to charge him in the homicide, and it was not."

At least some of the jurors rode an emotional roller coaster through the two-week trial, identifying with the young people who were involved that night.

Juror Skyler Kelm, 35, said he spent the bulk of the weekend worrying about the case.

"I'd have to say this was one of the toughest things I've been through," he said.

"I'm glad it's over," added juror Peter Jorgenson, 43. "This is a very difficult thing to look at. I don't think I've ever been through anything quite like this."

Only four of the 12 jurors stayed behind to speak with reporters. Jorgenson did so, he said, mainly so he could urge parents to stay close to their children.

"Tell the people to please be a part of their children's lives, because this is horrible," he said. "Please be a part of your children's lives. It's important."