Koi killers net probation Pair also fined, sentenced to 500 hours of community service

Santa Cruz Sentinal ^ | 4/17/04 | By CATHY REDFERN

[mylife]

Koi killers net probation Pair also fined, sentenced to 500 hours of community service

By CATHY REDFERN Sentinel STAFF WRITER

SANTA CRUZ — Two former UC Santa Cruz fraternity brothers netted a combined 500 hours of community service and five years probation Friday for stealing and sautéing Midas, an honored campus koi.

Casey Loop, 23, of San Jose and Matthew Cox, 22, of Santa Cruz pled no contest to misdemeanor vandalism and grand theft charges for the May 20 prank. They had faced a maximum of two years in jail.

Loop was ordered to serve three years of probation, 300 hours of community service and to attend 50 Alcoholics Anonymous meetings this year. Cox, who works in a local mental health facility, was given two years informal probation, 200 hours of community service and 25 AA meetings.

Both were ordered to serve at an animal shelter, a program counseling youth about alcohol and at Hakone Gardens in Saratoga, a Japanese garden where they can experience "the spiritual aspects of maintaining koi ponds," Judge Jeff Almquist said.

UC Santa Cruz animal control officer Jen Holz said the county’s Animal Services Agency declined the men’s help at first, but then relented.

Both were ordered to pay $500 to UC Santa Cruz for a new filtration system for the Porter College koi pond and to apologize to David Swanger, the creative writing professor who bought Midas. Swanger attended the hearing and said he liked the terms and their educational potential.

The courtroom was full as the disreputable deed was shown on film, courtesy of MTV, which had been shooting the now-banned Omega Delta Chi fraternity for a reality show. Prosecutor Gretchen Brock read media accounts of Loop’s denial of killing Midas before Loop appeared on screen gleefully holding the dying fish as he returned from the pond, flicking it in the head with his finger to show it was still alive.

Loop apologized in court and said he never intended to hurt anyone, just to catch and eat a fish. He said afterward it was unfair and that all the hoopla, including hate e-mails and phone calls, was unwarranted, as the victim was a fish. Almquist noted that Loop told probation officers recently that no other county would convict him for such actions.

The video showed several inebriated men watching as Loop sliced open Midas and Cox pan-fried the 20-pound, 8-year-old koi. The actual killing, using a 40-ounce beer bottle, was not shown.

Loop’s attorney, Paul Meltzer, said the university discipline process would have been a more appropriate forum for the case. Noting the existential fodder, he said fish are killed daily at the harbor and even at Monterey Bay Aquarium, where small fish are fed to larger fish.

He also called it "stupid, immature, drunken behavior" that would haunt his client, who wanted a now-impossible law enforcement career.

Greg Coben, Cox’s attorney, said swallowing goldfish was a long tradition in fraternities.

Almquist said it was a shame reality shows have such a low standard for what they put on television and said he hoped the district attorney had considered prosecuting MTV for providing the cameras and vehicles. He noted that alcohol often provides fuel for criminal cases.

Brock said she was pleased and hoped the sentence would give the men time to reflect, but that there was insufficient evidence to charge MTV for its role.

Two others recently were charged for their participation. Jonathan Bermudez’s attorney, Michael Chaney of Los Angeles, entered an innocent plea Friday while public defender Sean Gallagher was appointed to represent Jordan Trigg. A pretrial conference was scheduled for June 3.

[mylife]

Former UC Santa Cruz Delta Omega Chi fraternity member Casey Loop is recorded on an MTV video exulting as he holds up Midas the koi after taking it from the Porter College pond on May 20, 2003.

Both were ordered to serve at an animal shelter, a program counseling youth about alcohol and at Hakone Gardens in Saratoga, a Japanese garden where they can experience "the spiritual aspects of maintaining koi ponds," Judge Jeff Almquist said.

[Skywalk]

Yes it's only a fish, but there's way more to it than that and these guys knew that--drunk or not.

Maybe a caning would have done these guys good. Now they'll get to roll their eyes during their "counseling."

[South40]

Fish are your friends not food!

Or, so say the fine folks at PETA.

[cavtrooper21]

I bet mommy and daddy are REAL proud of their little darlings.
The whole thing is just sick.

[dalereed]

Anyone dumb enoiugh to eat a carp, especially a mutated one deserves what they get!

[claudiustg]

Life at UCSC will be very difficult for this young man.

[martin_fierro]

Both were ordered to serve at an animal shelter, a program counseling youth about alcohol and at Hakone Gardens in Saratoga

I regularly ride my motorcycle past there.

I should drop by sometime to see what true pinheads look like.

[Hank Kerchief]

Yes it's only a fish, but there's way more to it than that ...

WHAT?

[Welsh Rabbit]

The courtroom was full as the disreputable deed was shown on film, courtesy of MTV, which had been shooting the now-banned Omega Delta Chi fraternity for a reality show.

Almquist said it was a shame reality shows have such a low standard for what they put on television and said he hoped the district attorney had considered prosecuting MTV for providing the cameras and vehicles. He noted that alcohol often provides fuel for criminal cases.

I wonder if MTV provided free alcohol, like they have for their other reality shows. These two have only themselves to blame, but this is another example of how degenerate and morally bankrupt MTV is. Certainly doesn't sound like they were discouraging the act at the time.

[Skywalk]

If someone came in and killed your pet(and koi are more responsive to people than other types of fish) I doubt you'd be saying "its only a ___"

Property issues, respect issues, trespass.

Being a drunken idiot can lead to someone being a drunken idiot in other ways also.

These were not guys who drank a bit too much on the fishing boat and filmed it.

Personally, when my rabbit was still alive, if I caught anybody in the act of harming her, I'd have ended it swiftly and violently, but maybe that's just me.

The justice system doesn't work that way, thankfully, but drunken idiots who have no respect for anyone else should probably get a good caning.

[glock rocks]

[tiamat]

Those fish are really expensive, too!

[Lady Heron]

LOL! TVA at one point ran a program to try and get the people of Tennessee to eat the carp that were taking over the lakes in Tennessee. Lets just say it was a big failure. My dad still talks about the recipe for carp burgers.

[Hank Kerchief]

If someone came in and killed your pet ...

Whose pet was it?

koi are more responsive to people than other types of fish ...

Sure! But what about sharks, they're pretty responsive to people? They eat people. I say, turnabout is fair play.

[Welsh Rabbit]

Lets just say it was a big failure.

LOL! I wonder why...

[Sabatier]

If someone came in and killed your pet(and koi are more responsive to people than other types of fish) I doubt you'd be saying "its only a ___" Property issues, respect issues, trespass. Being a drunken idiot can lead to someone being a drunken idiot in other ways also. These were not guys who drank a bit too much on the fishing boat and filmed it. Personally, when my rabbit was still alive, if I caught anybody in the act of harming her, I'd have ended it swiftly and violently, but maybe that's just me. The justice system doesn't work that way, thankfully, but drunken idiots who have no respect for anyone else should probably get a good caning.

I completely agree. Torturing animals is one of the signs of sociopath tendencies. These creeps got off easy.

[BlazingArizona]

No, frat boys, carpe diem does not mean "goldfish served today"!

[Truth29]

This will probably be another failure of the justice system. The perps are full of resentment and have not learned respect for the law and property. They will be back before a judge again, for more serious crimes IMO.

[GovernmentShrinker]

It's way past time that our legal system instituted a principle that no impairment from self-administered recreational drugs will be considered in determining guilt or in sentencing. I get really sick of all the "but he didn't really mean to do it, he was just drunk" verdicts. Brutal murders dropped to "involuntary manslaughter", vandalism, domestic violence, animal abuse, all given preposterously light sentences; fires that burn down homes and even kill people, deemed "accidents" because the person who started them was drunk. The harm to the victims is just as bad, regardless of whether the perp was drunk or otherwise chemically impaired.

[Thud]

Many of the students at Porter College, where the pond for this koi was, considered it to be a pet of sorts. They walked by the pond daily and the fish was quite evident. Some were proud of it while others compared it to some of the faculty.