By LEANORA MINAI and MIKE BRASSFIELD

? St. Petersburg Times, published April 8, 1999

ST. PETERSBURG -- George Harvell told police he paid $232.66 for the Chinese semiautomatic rifle at a gun shop last year and used it for target practice. He sold it last month for $300 to a 17-year-old friend -- who police say used it to kill a 6-year-old girl as she slept Saturday. On Wednesday, Harvell, a 19-year-old high school dropout and the son of BankAtlantic executives, was charged with selling the combat weapon to a minor. He turned himself in to Pinellas County sheriff's detectives. "Selling a gun to a racist -- he should be treated like a felon," said the dead girl's father, Terry Mance. Police say Jessy Joe Roten, a self-proclaimed skinhead, went into an alley behind his Lealman-area home early Saturday and fired at least 12 rounds from the gun, one of which pierced the nearby home of Mance, who is black, and his fiancee, who is white. The single bullet killed Ashley Mance and wounded her twin sister, Aleesha, and her 4-year-old half-sister, Jailene Jones. Harvell's attorney, Jay Hebert, said Harvell was not involved in the shooting. But Harvell and Roten were friends who shared some of the same views and a penchant for firearms. "I think that they shared some similar beliefs," said Hebert, though he added his client is not "affiliated" with a skinhead group. He declined to elaborate.

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Harvell, who lives in a waterfront home at 2400 Coffee Pot Blvd. in northeast St. Petersburg, was released from Pinellas County Jail after posting $5,000 bail at 6 p.m. Wednesday. His parents, Allen and Georganne Harvell, did not comment Wednesday. Hebert, who represented Baptist leader Henry J. Lyons, spoke for their son. Hebert said he received a telephone call on Easter Sunday from Harvell's father, who contacted Assistant State Attorney Bruce Bartlett. "My client is devastated by the use of this gun," Hebert said. "His family is very ups