DEERFIELD BEACH, Fla., Oct. 25 (UPI) -- Most of the five Florida teens accused of setting a classmate on fire come from families with criminal arrests and histories of abuse, documents indicate.
A review of court and police reports and interviews of law enforcement authorities by The Miami Herald reveals all five suspects' family lives have been long troubled, the newspaper reported Sunday.
The five seventh-graders are accused of attacking 15-year-old Michael Brewer outside a Deerfield Beach, Fla., apartment complex this month and, after being ordered to do so by one of the boys, dousing him with rubbing alcohol and setting him ablaze.
The Herald cited records from Palm Beach and Broward counties indicating the parents of four of the boys have been convicted for crimes including child neglect, drunken driving, assault and battery, burglary, fleeing police, drug possession and drug dealing.
The newspaper said the father of one suspect was accused of stabbing a man in a money dispute, while two other the teen suspects, who are brothers, were once removed from their home because of child abuse.
