Editor:

I am writing this letter because I am concerned about the articles that were written about the Parham trial. I feel that I need to defend the kids involved.

These kids were sitting around a confined campfire around 7 p.m. when (defendant William Brent) Parham approached the fence line. Some have said there was a burn ban but this was proven to be not true by the county judge. The kids were terrified when he began shouting at them that he was going to kill them. Not all of the kids were close enough or took the time to stop and see if the object that Parham was pointing at them was a gun. That doesn’t take away from the fact that he did have a gun and was threatening them. When someone threatens to kill you — you assume they have a gun.

It has been written in previous articles that the kids lied. The kids did not lie; the defense attorney twisted their words in each of their statements so that they would fit his theory of what had happened or to discredit them on the stand. For example, if one of them said the phrase “be quiet” on the stand but then in their written testimony had said “shut up,” he accused them of lying. The statements written in the previous articles were the words of the defense attorney, not the facts of the case.

These kids were victims and witnesses in this case and told their account of what happened that evening.

It also has been stated in previous articles that Parham was hit over the head with something and dragged onto our property. This was a large man who weighed about 250 pounds at the time of the incident. There is no way these kids could have dragged this man over or under a fence through brush about 65 yards onto our property. The only explanation we have as to Parham’s behavior that night is, according to court evidence, his blood alcohol level was more than double the legal limit. This might help to explain why such a bizarre incident happened on Nov. 9, 2009.

Susan Lamb