Man guilty of threatening prosecutor

SAN BERNARDINO - A man accused of threatening the prosecutorhandling the case in the shooting death of 11-year-old MynishaCrenshaw accepted a plea bargain Wednesday that includes jail timeand probation.

Kevin Ray Baines, 20, pleaded guilty to one felony count of making criminal threats before Superior Court Judge Elva Soper andwill face a year in jail and five years' probation.

Baines reportedly sent a threat May 19 via the Internet to Deputy District Attorney Cheryl Kersey, the prosecutor in the girl's slaying, authorities said. Armed investigators began to accompanyKersey to court soon after the threat.

Authorities arrested Baines at a San Bernardino apartment buildingMay 25 and charged him with threatening a public official.

"The message was sent that you can't threaten prosecutors," saidstate prosecutor Randall D. Einhorn after Wednesday's courthearing.

The state Attorney General's Office handled the case because itinvolved a local prosecutor.

Under the plea agreement, Baines will also receive a strike on hisrecord for the offense, said Einhorn. Baines is scheduled to be backin court July 27 for a sentencing hearing.

The threat was directly related to Kersey's prosecution of the Mynisha case, Susan Mickey, spokeswoman for the District Attorney'sOffice, has said.

One of the defense attorneys in the Mynisha case, Daniel Mangan,filed a motion June 9 to have Kersey recused as prosecutor, arguingthe threats could create bias against his client, Patrick Lair.Other defense attorneys joined in the motion, which Superior Judge Donna Gunnell Garza is expected to hear July 10.

Mangan wrote in his motion that "the atmosphere created by the ever-vigilant armed security can only lead to the formation of agroup bias against Mr. Lair that is in conflict with his right to afair trial."

The District Attorney's Office blasted the motion, arguing that itis a deficient and inadmissible declaration that lacks evidence.

"Presumably, defendant expects us to assume that, in a case wherea relation of a co-defendant makes threats against the prosecutor,the prosecutor must necessarily be biased against the defendant,"Deputy District Attorney Brent Schultze wrote in his response tothe motion.

"Such an assumption is supported by neither law nor logic. Nor isit supported by any actual evidence in this case," Schultze wrote.

It is unclear how the plea bargain and the apparent resolution ofBaines' case would affect the motion to recuse Kersey.

In the complaint against Baines, prosecutors said he intended forhis comment to be taken as a threat and that he had the apparentability to carry it out.

Kersey was in sustained fear for her safety and the safety of herimmediate family, according to the complaint.

District Attorney Michael A. Ramos was not available for comment.

He said in an earlier statement: "We will not tolerate any threatto our prosecutors nor will we be intimidated in our pursuit toprotect the public."