Racial feud, trial leave big legal bill

By Mike McCollum , Pilot & Today

Published February 28, 2008 at 12:30 a.m.
Updated February 28, 2008 at 1:53 a.m.

Text size

More Local News

Almost six weeks after 15-year- old Randall Nelson was found not guilty of charges of assault and disorderly conduct stemming from a racially charged incident in February 2007 that left another boy with a broken jaw, legal and financial ramifications remain for the family.

In defending his son, now a freshman at Steamboat Springs High School, Brad Nelson learned a tough lesson: Good legal defense doesn't come cheap.

"If you want the best, you pay for the best," said Brad Nelson, who faces more than $40,000 of legal fees and other expenses related to his son's defense.

During Randall Nelson's years at Steamboat Springs Middle School, the other boy, who is white, taunted and threatened Randall, who is black, because of his race, according to the family's Steamboat Springs attorney, Kris Hammond.

Administrators depicted the incident as a wake-up call about harassment in local schools, which prompted a revamping of policies in the Steamboat Springs School District, where 91.7 percent of students are white.

"Our defense was self-defense, but you can't have a defense where you punched someone because they made you mad," said Hammond, who noted that it was demonstrated to the jury that Randall Nelson was indeed threatened.

Constant use of the N-word by the victim created in Randall's mind a threat, Hammond said.

"There is no other word like it in the English language," he added. "It conveys a threat without coming out and saying it. . . . There is no nice way for a white person to say that to a black person, regardless what the meaning is."

Brad Nelson said he's proud that his son's harassment shed light on racial intolerance, but that lesson came with a heavy price. He said the legal bills may force the family to move from Steamboat, where they have lived for more than 10 years.

"That's still definitely in the cards, no doubt," he said. "My wife has been on a medical leave of absence for seven to eight months because of the stress of this, and one income in Steamboat doesn't quite make it. . . . Due to financial reasons, we may have to jump ship here, unfortunately."

Subscribe to the Rocky Mountain News