Attorney Says Slain Youth Provoked Fight : Simi Valley: Phillip Hernandez’s public defender charges that Chad Patrick Hubbard, 14, had been drinking the day of the stabbing.

Chad Patrick Hubbard, the popular 14-year-old who was fatally stabbed by a younger classmate two months ago, had been drinking and provoked the fight at a Simi Valley school that culminated in his death, a public defender said Monday.

“By the end of day, his blood-alcohol level was 0.06(%),” said Deputy Public Defender Donna Forry, who represents Phillip Hernandez, the boy charged with Chad’s murder, who went on trial Monday in Juvenile Court.

Deputy Dist. Atty. James D. Ellison agreed that Chad started a fistfight with Hernandez, but said that still does not justify murder.

“The minor (Hernandez) took a folding knife and plunged it into the chest of Chad Hubbard,” Ellison told the judge. “It pierced his heart, and Chad Hubbard died as a result.”

The attorneys’ statements in Ventura County Superior Court preceded a full day of testimony from Valley View Junior High School friends of the victim and defendant.

Jackie Hubbard, Chad’s mother, confirmed that her son had been drinking prior to the incident. But she said his blood-alcohol level was 0.04%, not 0.06%.

“He definitely was drinking. Someone had given him something to drink. Two girls had brought it to school. It was not an everyday thing,” the mother said.

She blamed school officials for the stabbing incident.

“First of all, Chad should have been suspended for drinking at school,” she said. “And second, he shouldn’t have been murdered at school.”

Simi Valley Unified School District Supt. Mary Beth Wolford declined to respond to the criticism.

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Many teen-age classmates, called to testify about the bitter relationship between the two boys, appeared uncomfortable on the witness stand, fidgeting and answering questions with a shrug of the shoulders. On several occasions, Judge Allan Steele ordered them to sit closer to the microphone or raise their voices.

Hernandez is charged with a single count of murder in Chad’s death.

Five students testified Monday that the two boys had been embroiled in a running feud for several weeks before the Feb. 1 stabbing.

They generally described the larger and stronger Chad as the aggressor. But they also said that Hernandez, 13 at the time of the stabbing, was a willing participant in several pushing matches with his foe.

In his opening statement, Ellison said the prosecution will show that Chad and Hernandez’s dislike for one another grew in intensity up to the day of the stabbing.

He acknowledged that Chad struck Hernandez with a closed fist at least two times before the defendant pulled out the folding knife.

The defense plans to prove that Hernandez had no malicious intent when he stabbed the victim. Forry said Hernandez was just tired of being harassed by Chad.

She said Chad had been drinking alcoholic beverages since his first class that day. Before the stabbing, he had confronted Hernandez three times, either flashing signs to indicate that he would shoot the defendant or just following him around, she said.

The fourth time that Chad approached Hernandez, Forry said, “he was pushing Phillip, saying things to Phillip. . . . Finally Chad pulled off his jacket and was saying, ‘I need to straighten this fool out.’ ”

Forry said Hernandez stabbed the victim “in an effort to stop Chad from severely hurting him.”

About a week before the stabbing, right after the school reopened following the Northridge earthquake, Chad and Hernandez got into a confrontation on the athletic field, witnesses testified. They gave each other dirty looks and started pushing one another as their friends tried to separate them, according to testimony.

That incident, which started after Hernandez had thrown a football toward a basketball court where Chad and some others were playing, was the last confrontation before the stabbing, witnesses testified.

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It was also during that incident that Chad accused Hernandez of stealing his baseball cap, a charge that Hernandez staunchly denied, they said.

After the pushing incident, the two boys were successful in staying clear of one another for a week, said Eric J. Albertson, one of Chad’s best friends. “In my opinion, I thought it sort of mellowed out,” Albertson told the judge.

Albertson also conceded that Chad had a decided advantage over Hernandez in a fistfight because of his athleticism and strong build.

“He was not the kind of boy you’d want to get into a fight with, was he?” Forry asked him under cross examination.

“No,” the boy replied.

Candice Brewer, an eighth-grader, said Hernandez had showed her a knife days before the stabbing.

“Chad thought he called him a punk,” she said. “Phillip said he didn’t call him a punk.”

But she said Hernandez did not seem eager to fight Chad. She was asked why she believed that. “Because he’s smaller, and I just think that,” she said.

Heather Terry, another eighth-grader who was Chad’s friend, said Hernandez had promised to kill Chad if Chad did not stop pushing him around.

She also said it had become a common occurrence for students at the school to see the two confronting each other. During the pushing incident on the athletic field, she said, “my friends go, ‘Oh, no, there goes Chad and Phillip again.’ ”

Some of the most dramatic testimony came from Eduardo Bedolla, a friend of Hernandez’s who said he tried to stop Chad from confronting Hernandez before the stabbing.

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After school that day, Eduardo, Hernandez and a third boy were stopped three times by Chad before they could reach their school bus, Eduardo said, adding that each time, Chad challenged Hernandez to a fight.

Finally, near the bus stop, Chad came up and punched Hernandez in the chest, he said. Hernandez, he said, did not fight back.

Eduardo said he grabbed Chad but released his grip after Chad promised that he would leave and not hit Hernandez again. Instead, Chad took another swing at Hernandez, who had the knife in his hand and stabbed Chad, Eduardo testified.

Chad immediately fell to the ground, Eduardo said.

“That’s when Phillip ran,” he said.

The trial, expected to last throughout the week, continues this morning with more testimony from juvenile witnesses.