Moving on with their lives

Deepa Bharath

COSTA MESA -- Barely a day after a jury determined that her daughter’s

killer should be imprisoned for life, Cindy Soto decided to lobby for a

state law that would allow mentally ill people to receive treatment

without checking into a hospital.

Soto said throughout the three months of the trial, she couldn’t wait

for a verdict against Steven Allen Abrams, who in May 1999 plowed his car

into a preschool, killing her daughter Sierra Soto, 4, and Brandon

Wiener, 3.

At a board meeting of Sierra’s Light Foundation, created in her

daughter’s and Brandon’s memory, Soto proposed Thursday to seek support

for California legislation based on New York’s Kendra’s Law, named after

a girl who was pushed to her death on a subway train track by a psychotic

man.

“Isn’t this ironic,” Soto said, smiling as she asked the rhetorical

question, “that we’re having our meeting the day after?”

Pam Wiener, Brandon’s mother and also a board member, solemnly nodded

in response.

On Wednesday, jurors deliberated for four hours and decided that

Abrams should be sentenced to life in prison. In August, he was convicted

of two counts of murder and several counts of attempted murder.

For Soto and Wiener, it is now time to move on.

“I feel like I’ve been set free to do the things I want to do on this

issue,” Soto said. “My hands were tied because of the trial.”

Soto founded the nonprofit foundation in June 1999 with the intent to

help preschools and day-care centers make their campuses safer. Now, the

organization is taking another step toward children’s safety.

During the trial, Abrams’ attorneys argued he was psychotic based on

his delusion that so-called “brain wave people” manipulated his thoughts

and wanted to make him a killer. Abrams told police he killed the

children to get back at the brain wave people. The prosecution convinced

the jury that Abrams’ psychosis was drug-induced, leading to the verdict

that he was legally sane when he committed the crimes.

According to testimonies in the trial, Abrams too had a history of

mental illness since 1992 and at some point had stopped taking his

medication, which worsened his condition.

With Kendra’s Law, that situation would not arise because patients

would be monitored through an outpatient treatment system, Soto said.

“These people are sick enough to think they don’t need medication,”

she said. “But the community does have the right to safety.”

The law will help avoid a situation where mental illness leads to a

crime that deeply affects the community, she said. Sierra’s Light

Foundation will seek political support for this legislation, Soto said.

“It would be nice if we could call it the Sierra Brandon law,” she

said, looking across the table at Wiener. “Maybe if we had a law like

this in place, our children wouldn’t have died.”

Wiener said working with the foundation has helped both the moms

channel their grief and anguish into something positive.

“Our focus is to prevent such tragedies from happening in the future,”

she said. “That’s our focus -- the future.”

Wiener said she knows it’s going to be a rough road ahead without

Brandon.

She and her family will be tortured by constant reminders of his

absence, at Christmas, Hanukkah, birthdays, anniversaries and weddings.

Their lips smile, but their eyes cloud with tears knowing there is a

vacant chair at the table, that an important piece of their being is

lost.

Forever.

She is happy with the jury’s verdict, Wiener said, but has “mixed

feelings about it.””He deserved the death sentence for what he did,” she

said. “But then, I think that would have been the easy way out. I just

hope he is mentally tortured and tormented every day he spends in jail,

like we’ve been.”

The verdict has also given a sense of closure for the other victims of

the incident who were injured. Chase McDill, then 3, still has physical

and emotional scars, said his mother Judy McDill.

McDill was able to tell her son “the bad man” will never walk the

streets again or hurt anybody. It also will help Chase to not constantly

see his attacker’s face on TV or sprawled on the front pages of

newspapers, she said.

“I wanted him to get the death penalty,” she said. “But this is OK.

I’ll accept it. I just wanted to see this end.”

Christina Shokrollahi’s son, Daniel Shokrollahi, was in the playground

during the rampage and witnessed the children getting hit. His mother

said the verdict is an end, “but there’s no way to feel good about it.”

“With that kind of a person, I just wish him gone,” Shokrollahi said,

adding that she supported the death penalty for Abrams.

She said the horrible memories are branded in her son’s mind.

“The other day when we were driving, a car gunned its engine and he

got hysterical,” she said. “He was instantly reminded of that day.”

But Shokrollahi said she tries to make Daniel remember the good things

Brandon and Sierra stood for.

“I don’t want him to have morbid memories of those sweet children,”

she said. “I want him to think of them in a positive and respectful way.”