CINCINNATI (AP) — A judge on Friday chastised a man accused of starting a melee that involved up to 20 people at a southwest Ohio kindergarten graduation earlier in the week.
Hamilton County Municipal Court Judge Bernie Bouchard said 33-year-old Raymond Walker showed poor judgment.
“As an adult, he is supposed to set an example,” Bouchard said as he set bond at $50,000 on charges of assault and inducing panic. “He’s showing all these kids that vigilante justice is OK.”
Defense attorney Victor Dwayne Sims said there has been a rush to judgment and that the case has been blown out of proportion.
“I think that certainly, violence is not a good thing for our children to see,” Sims told The Cincinnati Enquirer. “However, there is such a thing as reality TV that we seem to want our children to watch all the time.”
He said Walker, who turned himself in Thursday, is a father who works as a landscaper.
Police say Walker hit another man on Monday over an apparent domestic dispute while newly graduated kindergarten students were celebrating with punch and cookies, triggering a melee that resulted in the lockdown of an elementary school in Mount Healthy while police responded.
Walker’s case will go next to a Hamilton County grand jury.
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Information from: The Cincinnati Enquirer, http://www.enquirer.com
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