Ninham and the other four juveniles
Omer Ninham (Defendant) was convicted of firstdegree intentional homicide and was sentenced to life in prison without possibility of parole. Ninham filed a motion for relief from his life sentence, seeking to allow for the possibility of parole. The Circuit Court denied the motion. Ninham appealed. The Supreme Court affirmed.
On September 24, 1998, around dusk, 13-year-old Vang was bicycling home along Webster Avenue in Green Bay, Wisconsin. Vang’s older brother had sent Vang to the grocery store for tomatoes. Vang was returning home on his bicycle, carrying a plastic grocery bag filled with tomatoes, when he was approached by five juveniles: 14-year-old Ninham, 13-year-old Richard Crapeau (Crapeau), 13-yearold Jeffrey P., 14-year-old Amanda G., and 14-yearold Christin J.
Ninham and the other four juveniles did not know or recognize Vang. Moreover, by all accounts, Vang never said or did anything to provoke the five juveniles. Rather, at the time, Crapeau was upset with his mother and “wanted to fight or see a fight.” Consequently, Crapeau said to Ninham, “Let’s mess with this kid,” and Ninham responded, ‘”I got your back,’ meaning he would back [Crapeau] up in a fight.” Ninham and Crapeau began by verbally taunting Vang, while the other three juveniles “egg[ed]” them on. Ninham and Crapeau’s assaults escalated into physical attacks. Crapeau bumped into Vang’s shoulder and yanked his bicycle away from him. Crapeau also grabbed Vang’s grocery bag out of his hands and threw it in the direction of St. Vincent’s Hospital, located along the same street. When Vang asked for his bicycle back, Ninham punched Vang, knocking him down.
Vang got up and started running towards the nearby St. Vincent’s Hospital parking ramp. All five juveniles chased after Vang, eventually catching up to him on the top, or fifth floor, of the parking ramp. When they caught up to him, Crapeau punched Vang in the face. Vang repeatedly asked why they were trying to hurt him and pleaded with them to leave him alone. Instead, Ninham and Crapeau began pushing Vang back and forth between them, in a game Jeffrey P. referred to as “chicken.” Ninham punched Vang in the chest as he pushed him back and forth. Ninham then pinned Vang by his wrists against the parking ramp’s concrete wall. While Vang squirmed to get out of Ninham’s grasp, Crapeau again punched Vang in the face. According to Crapeau, Vang was crying and screaming, “Let me go.”
With Ninham still holding Vang by his wrists, Crapeau grabbed Vang’s ankles. Ninham and Crapeau then began swinging Vang back and forth out over the parking ramp’s concrete wall-a drop that measured nearly 45 feet to the ground. Vang was crying and screaming, begging Ninham and Crapeau not to drop him. While swinging Vang out over the wall, Crapeau let go of Vang’s feet and told Ninham to “drop him.” Ninham let go of Vang’s wrists, and in Crapeau’s words, Vang “just sailed out over the wall.”
Vang landed on his back on the parking ramp’s paved exit lane, 12 feet from the base of the ramp. Rescue personnel, dispatched at 8:03 P.M., detected a faint pulse from Vang. Vang was transported to St. Vincent’s Hospital where physicians were unable to revive him. An autopsy revealed that Vang suffered a blunt impact to his head and trunk and died from craniocerebral trauma due to a fall from height.