Leuzinger High Suspends 8 in Attack

Leuzinger High School officials have suspended eight students for their role in the beating of a ninth-grade boy at the Lawndale campus on Wednesday.

Sheriff’s deputies say the attack, which left the victim with a severe eye injury, was “strictly gang-related” and also not tied to a brawl on the campus last month between dozens of black and Latino students.

School employees who witnessed the attack caught two of the students, who were later booked on charges of assault with intent to commit great bodily harm. Denard McKinley, 18, of Hawthorne, pleaded not guilty at his arraignment Friday and a preliminary hearing was set for June 10. The other student, a 17-year-old Hawthorne resident whose name was withheld, is expected to be arraigned in juvenile court next week, said a spokesman for the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department.

The victim, a 14-year-old Hawthorne resident whose name was not released, suffered a ruptured eye in the attack and underwent surgery this week at Centinela Hospital Medical Center in Inglewood.