SAN DIEGO -- Several of the five young men charged with murder in the beating death of a professional surfer in La Jolla are contemplating plea deals that could lessen their exposure in the case, a judge said Monday.

Seth Cravens, 22, Orlando Osuna, 23, Matthew Yanke and Eric House, both 21, and Hank Hendricks, 22, are charged in the death last year of 24-year-old Emery Kauanui.

They each face a maximum of 15 years to life in prison if convicted of murder.

Cravens' attorney, Mary Ellen Attridge, said the deal offered to her client is unacceptable and he will go to trial. She said one of the other defendants might also opt for trial, leaving three defendants expected to enter into a plea agreement on Friday morning.

"We have a very good case at trial. He's (Cravens) is a very young man," Attridge told reporters after a brief court hearing.

The attorney accused prosecutors of overstating their case and offering Cravens a deal that would have exposed him to too many years behind bars. "So I said, Let's lock and load. Let's go to trial," Attridge told reporters.

Prosecutors refused to comment after Monday's hearing.

Attridge said the case against her client should have been filed as a voluntary manslaughter case.

The attorney said she has done extensive investigation in the case, and some of the counts against the defendants are "unprovable."

One witness to the fight in which Kauanui died said he was only 50 percent sure he saw Cravens at the scene, Attridge said.

"I'm not going to plead him (Cravens) to those sorts of counts," the attorney said.

After an eight-day preliminary hearing last month, Judge John Einhorn held the defendants to answer to the second-degree murder charge, but ruled they were not members of a gang called the Bird Rock Bandits.

The judge also ordered Cravens to trial on charges of making a criminal threat, battery and assault causing great bodily injury in connection with a series of separate attacks dating back to 2004.

Einhorn also found that Osuna, Yanke and Hendricks should stand trial in connection with previous assaults.

The judge said he wasn't sure if even a conviction for second-degree murder would hold up on appeal.

Attridge said the previous assaults were originally deemed not prosecutable, then brought back when the case involving Kauanui came about.

She said it was not ethical for prosecutors to "bootstrap" the previous assaults on top of the current murder case.

Cravens is ready to go to trial and prove that he is not the "menace" he has been made out to be, Attridge said.

After the preliminary hearing, Einhorn said he was bothered by the fact that the case was initially filed as a murder case against Cravens, Osuna, Yanke and House, but the additional assault charges were added after witnesses told authorities that the defendants were part of a gang, which the judge determined not to be the case.

Hendricks, a former La Jolla High and University of New Hampshire quarterback, was charged several months later, after he told police what he saw the night of the fight.

Prosecutor Sophia Roach has said the assault on Kauanui was a group attack in which each defendant aided one another in order to ensure victory for their gang. Roach has said her office would review the case and consider if any enhancements or charges should be re-filed.

She alleged that Kauanui was beaten on May 24, 2007, at the direction of Cravens, who encouraged House to fight the surfer after he victim spilled or poured a drink on House at a nearby bar.

Prosecutors theorize that once House and Kauanui squared off in a one-on- one fight, Cravens, Yanke, Osuna and Hendricks joined in hitting and kicking the victim while he was on the ground.

Defense attorneys said none of their clients kicked or beat Kauanui after he was on the ground, as alleged by prosecutors.

The prosecution alleges Cravens sucker-punched Kauanui in the chin when he got up, knocking him out and causing him to fall back and hit his head on the pavement.

Kauanui was placed on life-support and died four days later at a hospital from brain injuries.

Yanke, House, Osuna and Hendricks are all free after posting bail. Cravens remains in custody in lieu of $1.5 million bail.