Man convicted of 2009 triple murder in Dorchester

A Suffolk Superior Court jury today conviced Keron Pierre on three counts of first-degree murder for gunning down three people outside a Mt. Ida Road house party in 2009, the Suffolk County District Attorney's office reports.

The verdicts mean life without possibility of parole for Pierre, who fled to Trinidad after the murders - and where he fought an unsuccessful battle against extradition to face arraignment for the murders of Shacora Gaines, Chantal Palmer, and Anthony Peoples.

According to the DA's office, the victims - and a woman who survived - were sitting in a car waiting for friends after a fundraising party:

Pierre, who was with a group of his own friends, approached the car in a bid to speak to the young women inside. They were not interested.

Instead of walking away, Pierre reached to his waist, pulled a .40 caliber semiautomatic handgun, and began firing into the car. Gaines, 20, and Peoples, 19, were killed immediately; Palmer, 20, died of her injuries at Boston Medical Center. The fourth victim, 23 at the time, was miraculously unhurt though a bullet passed through her coat, mere inches from her body.