US boy fatally stabbed by 12-year-old

[Annihilation]

US boy fatally stabbed by 12-year-old

AP August 6, 2014, 2:48 pm

A nine-year-old US boy has died after being repeatedly stabbed by a 12-year-old boy at a playground.

Michael Conner Verkerke ran home and collapsed on the porch around 6pm on Monday after he was stabbed at a mobile home park in western Michigan, according to police.

Investigators said the older boy then left the playground and called police from a nearby home to turn himself in.

The 12-year-old pleaded not guilty to a murder charge in juvenile court on Tuesday, according to his lawyer. He was ordered held in a juvenile detention centre.

Barb Poelman told The Associated Press she was sitting on her deck in a mobile home park when "we heard the kids run across the front ... screaming. He (Michael) ran with the kids that were with him".

She said the boy's mother was distraught, pleading for help as she lay on the grass outside the family's home.

"She was screaming, 'Where is the ambulance?' while her boy was laying on the porch bleeding," Poelman said.

Witnesses told investigators that four children were playing when one of them, for unknown reasons, pulled a knife and stabbed the boy.

Glen Stacy, who lives nearby, told The Grand Rapids Press said when police arrived at the mobile home park, they first went to help the stabbing victim, but the older boy called out to the officers to pick him up.

The motive in the attack was still being investigated, Police Chief Thomas Hillen said.