1. She was 16, six months pregnant and waiting for the bus that would take her to school on a March morning.

At the bus stop, 18-year-old Amanjanea Whitley approached the younger teen.

The two began to argue and then minutes later, physically fight, according to prosecutors.

As they brawled, prosecutors say, the 16-year-old pulled a knife with a pink handle and a 3½ -inch blade and stabbed Whitley once in the chest and a second time in the back. Whitley, who was unarmed, died minutes later.

The younger teen was arrested and charged with second-degree murder.

On Monday, the third day of trial in a courtroom in D.C. Superior Court, the teen’s attorneys called the defendant and also witnesses to the stabbing who they think will help support the argument that their client was acting in self-defense when she killed Whitley.

Another witness, according to prosecutors and lawyers for the teen, had said the 16-year-old had swung first in the fight after agreeing to step into a grassy area near the bus stop for the standoff.

The Washington Post generally does not identify suspects charged in juvenile court. Court officials allowed The Post to cover the juvenile hearing — which usually is closed to the public — on the condition that the name of the teen charged would not be revealed.

Judge Kimberley Knowles further limited access to the proceedings and cleared the courtroom when some juvenile witnesses, including the defendant on Monday, took the stand saying that the witnesses were too anxious to testify in open court.

Before she testified, the teen, who has given birth and also has another young child, sat next to her attorneys while her parents sat behind her. While the teen was pregnant and awaiting trial, Knowles ordered her released from detention after her attorneys argued that the Department of Youth Rehabilitation Services was not a healthy environment in which to give birth.

It remains unclear what the teens were arguing about at 9:30 a.m. March 22 at the bus stop in the 4800 block of Benning Road SE. The families of the teens lived near each other in the Simple City neighborhood of Southeast Washington. During the trial, the teen’s public defenders repeatedly argued that their client was defending herself and her unborn child when Whitley angrily approached her.

William Alley, one of the teen’s public defenders, said his client told Whitley she would fight her but wanted to wait until after she had given birth. “I told her to wait until I drop my baby,’ Alley quoted her as saying.

Alley said Whitley was “hell bent” on attacking his client. “My client did not want any of this to happen. She was protecting her life and [the] life of her unborn child,” Alley argued.

Whitley’s parents and her grandmother sat on the opposite side of the courtroom from the teen’s family.

Whitley’s mother was holding a Bible and reading silently from Proverbs.

As the teen’s attorney continued to argue that his client was acting in self-defense, Whitley’s grandmother yelled, “She stabbed her in the back! It’s not self-defense when someone is stabbed in the back!” She was removed by a U.S. marshal.

D.C. police officer Elmo English, one of the officers called to the stabbing scene, testified that when he arrived, he saw Whitley’s older brother cradling her limp body, “like a baby close to his chest,” as she bled.

No jury is present during the trial, and the judge will issue a verdict. Closing arguments are expected Tuesday.

Standing outside of the courtroom as one of the witnesses testified in his daughter’s death, Whitley’s father, Sandy Gilbert, defended his daughter and said she was the victim.

“My daughter is not a bully. That is not how she was raised,” he said.

Source: washingtonpost.com

Date Posted: Tuesday, August 23rd, 2016 , Total Page Views: 3054