Jurors acquitted Lavonrence Perkins on March 18 of the 2010 murder of Cordell McAfee.
Perkins, 23, was accused of shooting 22-year-old McAfee while he was sitting on a relative’s porch on Roseland Street in May 2010. McAfee was struck twice and died of his injuries.
This was Perkins’ second trial for the murder. A previous jury deadlocked on the charges in 2012. Read more
A Boston teen was acquitted in the 2011 murder of an Irishman but convicted of separate double shootings, the Suffolk District Attorney’s office announced.
Jurors in late March found John Graham, 19, innocent of first-degree murder and armed assault in a botched robbery attempt that killed Ciaran Conneely. His death has shaken the Boston Irish community.
Twenty days after Conneely’s murder, Graham shot two young men he was trying to rob, nearly killing one man. The men did not identify Graham as their assailant during the trial.
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A man was killed Tuesday evening on Dorchester Avenue in what investigators believe was a hit-and-run collision, the Boston Police Department said.
Officer Nicole Grant said the victim’s identity is not being released at this time and police are still searching for the driver of the vehicle that hit him.
Around 8 p.m., officers responded to a call of an injured pedestrian near 1485 Dorchester Ave, according to a police statement.
When they arrived at the scene, the man was being treated by EMS. He was taken to Boston Medical Center, where he later died, the statement said.
Police said the car that struck the man may have been a late model Toyota Camry or Nissan Maxima. They asked that anyone with information on the accident call 1-800-494-TIPS.
The following is a Boston Police Statement on the death:
At about 8:04pm, on Tuesday, February 4, 2014, officers from District C-11 (Dorchester) responded to a radio call for a pedestrian struck in the area of 1485 Dorchester Avenue.
On arrival, officers observed the male victim receiving treatment by Boston Emergency Technicians. The victim suffering from life threatening injuries was transported to Boston Medical Center, where he was later pronounced deceased.
Preliminary investigation suggests the operator of the motor vehicle (possibly a late model Toyota Camry or Nissan Maxima) did not stop after striking the victim. The suspect fled the area on Adams Street towards Park Street.
No further details are available at this time.
The Homicide Unit and Accident Reconstruction Team are actively investigating the facts and circumstances surrounding this incident. Anyone with information is encouraged to call detectives at (617) 343-4470.
Community members wishing to assist this investigation anonymously can do so by calling the CrimeStoppers Tip Line at 1(800) 494-TIPS or by texting the word ‘TIP’ to CRIME (27463). The Boston Police Department will stringently guard and protect the identities of those who wish to help this investigation anonymously.
Jurors are now deliberating in the murder trial of John Graham, accused of killing Ciaran Conneely, an Aran Islands native whose death has gripped the Irish community in Boston.
At closing arguments Tuesday, the prosecution said the best evidence against Graham, 19, came from his own mouth.
“He boasted to everybody that he had a body. ‘I got a body. I got a body,’ he went around saying. He told his sister,” said prosecutor Ian Polumbaum in a courtroom packed with onlookers and Conneely’s friends in Suffolk Superior Court.
Graham, who was arrested at age 16, is charged with first-degree murder in the death of Conneely, 36, in Dorchester. Authorities said Conneely was killed in October 2011 following a botched robbery attempt.
The only piece of evidence clearly implicating Graham was his sister, Tenesia Graham’s testimony, the defense said, but even that was shaky.
Tenesia told a grand jury that accusations against her brother were lies. However, during the trial, she told the court her brother eventually admitted he shot somebody after her repeated questioning.
“All they have is her because the rest is crap,” defense lawyer Robert Sheketoff told the jury. “She saw the internal contradiction — she’s no dummy. She was changing it because she’s a liar.”
Sheketoff emphasized that the Graham siblings were not close. They did not grow up together, and John Graham spent much of his childhood homeless.
He also highlighted Tenisia’s relationship and baby with Joel Winslow, a member of her brother’s “inner crew.” The defense stressed Tenisia’s motive in her testimony was to protect Winslow and not her brother.
“She’s in a complicated relationship with Mr. Winslow and still loves him,” Sheketoff said.
Winslow was with Graham the night of the murder, but testified that he left when he felt Graham was looking for trouble. When Winslow was arrested for a suspended license a few weeks after the murder, he alerted police to Graham’s boastful confessions.
Taking inspiration from the biblical tale of Cain and Abel, Sheketoff told jurors that Winslow was like a big brother to Graham who in the end framed him.
The prosecution in return said Winslow would never hurt his “baby brother” and called the defense “pure fantasy.”
“They’re [the defense] trying to sell you a certain view of the evidence,” Polumbaum said.
Graham also faces an additional eight charges, which include the shooting of two other men, who he allegedly tried to rob in late October 2011.
“He got nothing and accomplished nothing except to leave three victims on the ground with sadly one dead,” said Polumbaum.
A minute before he was shot, Hoang Vo said, his assailant had asked him for a cigarette.
Vo and a friend were walking on Monsignor Patrick J Lydon Way on Oct. 30, 2011 when a would-be robber approached them on the street and shot them, authorities have said. Prosecutors said that man was John Graham, now 19 and on trial for the murder of Ciaran Conneely, a 36-year-old man who was killed in a separate incident on Oct. 10, 2011 on Nahant Avenue in Dorchester.
Vo, 22, testified that he and his friend had gone to a convenience store to buy a cigarillo to smoke marijuana and were walking back to his house when a young man sitting on some steps near the sidewalk asked for a cigarette. He and his friend kept walking. Seconds later, Vo said, he heard footsteps on the pavement behind him.
The man from the stairs had pulled up the hood of his sweatshirt, and now he had a gun. He demanded Vo and his friend empty their pockets.
“I’m going to give you to the count of three,” Vo recalled the man saying.
At that point, he and his friend began backing up into the street. But according to Vo, his friend said something first: “Three, two, one, nigger.”
“What happened then?” Prosecutor Ian Polumbaum asked Vo in court Friday.
“He shot us.”
Vo said he didn’t know he had been hit until his mom came outside screaming and told him to take off his jacket. Blood poured into his hand, he said. A bullet had lodged in his elbow. His friend fell to the ground and asked for an ambulance, Vo recalled.
The man who tried to rob them took off down Monsignor Patrick J Lydon Way in the direction of Dorchester Avenue.
Vo and his friend both survived the incident. He did not identify Graham as his attacker during the trial Friday. But prosecutors plan to argue that a bullet fragment recovered from either Vo or his friend matched the bullet that killed Conneely about three weeks earlier on Nahant Avenue, according to the Suffolk County District Attorney’s office.
Prosecutors allege that Graham shot Conneely after attempting to rob him. He faces several charges, including first-degree murder, armed assault with intent to rob, and unlawful possession of a firearm, in connection with the killing of Conneely and the later shooting of Vo and his friend.
During a Boston Police staffing ceremony, Commissioner William Evans and Mayor Martin Walsh took the opportunity to speak on the deadly rise in violence the city has seen in the short start to the new year, according to a statement from police.
January had nine homicides with another two so far this month. Many of the killings appear to be gang-related, including a string of four fatal shootings in the end of January, according to police.
The recent spike in violence includes Friday’s alleged accidental shooting of Jan Marcos Peña. His 14-year-old unidentified brother is accused of killing the 9-year-old Mattapan resident when he was “recklessly” handling a firearm that struck his brother in their apartment, Suffolk District Attorney Daniel Conley’s office said in a statement.
“We’ve made progress in important areas, but everyone knows that we can’t let up, especially in the communities that are hardest hit by violence,” Walsh said at the ceremony, the Globe reported. “We’ve seen recently how violence can escalate, and how destructive and tragic illegal guns can be. We have to get these illegal guns off the street.”
The eldest brother was arraigned Monday and ordered held on a $50,000 bail. He is charged with involuntary manslaughter and possession of an illegal firearm.
An online memorial fund to honor 21-year-old Dorchester native Andrew McGee, who was fatally shot last year, raised almost $2,000 in hopes of creating a college scholarship fund in his name.
McGee was killed in a double shooting just before 11 p.m. on Nov. 16 in Dorchester, Suffolk District Attorney Daniel Conley’s office said. An unidentified 19-year-old male, whom family have identified as McGee’s cousin, Ron, was also injured, according to a press release from Conley’s office.
McGee was visiting family in Dorchester with his cousin when they were shot, the personal website created by his family says.
Both men were shot in front of a home on Whitman Street and McGee was taken to Boston Medical Center where he was pronounced dead, the press release said.
The investigation into his death is ongoing, Conley’s office said.
Andy was born and raised in Boston. Before that senseless and horrible event that Saturday evening, Andy lived happily with his Mom Della. Andy was her only child and so Andy and his Mom were not just Mother and son, they were pals. Because Andy was her only son, Della was strict when it came to raising him. She diligently kept her son off the streets and out of the trouble so many young men find themselves in when living in a big city.
- See more at the online fundraiser
At about, 10:52pm on Saturday, November 16, 2013, officers from District B-3 (Mattapan) responded to shot spotter activation in the area of8 Whitman St, Dorchester.
Upon arrival officer observed two male victims on the ground outside the address suffering from what appeared to be gunshot wounds. Both victims were transported to Boston Medical Center. One of the male victims was later pronounced deceased at the hospital. The victim was later identified as Andrew McGee, 21, of Dorchester.
The Boston Police Homicide Unit is actively investigating the facts and circumstances of this incident. Anyone with information is urged to contact Boston Police Homicide Unit at (617) 343-4470.
Community members who wish to assist this investigation anonymously can either call the CrimeStoppers Tip Line at 1 (800) 494-TIPS or text the word ‘TIP’ to CRIME (27463). The Boston Police Department is only interested in your information, not your identity.
