The Supreme Judicial Court ruled today that Manuel Andrade, now 47, deserves the sentence of life without possibility of parole he got for starting the shootout outside a Geneva Avenue house party that left a 22-year-old woman visiting from Kentucky dead of a gunshot wound to the head. Read more.
The Globe reports a Suffolk Superior Court jury today found Manuel "Spank" Andrade guilty for the shooting death of the visiting Kentucky student outside a Geneva Avenue party on March 24, 2007.
A Suffolk County Superior Court jury today found Casimiro Barros of Roxbury guilty of voluntary manslaughter, rather than first-degree murder, in the March 24, 2007 death of Chiara Levin outside a Dorchester house party, according to the Suffolk County District Attorney's office.
Prosecutors had sought a first-degree conviction, which would have sent Barros away for life without the possibility of parole.
The case of a second man charged with Levin's murder, Manuel Andrade, 36, of Dorchester, has yet to come to trial. Levin was killed in the crossfire between the two, which prosecutors say was the violent culmination of a long-standing beef between Barros's Roxbury boys and Andrade's Dorchester associates.
Prosecutors allege Barros and Andrade got into a battle inside - which ended with Andrade throwing a plate of food at one of Barros's pals and then shooting him in the shoulder for good measure - and that they took the fight outside, pulling guns and taking aim at each other. Officials say one of Barros's bullets hit Levin, sitting inside Andrade's Escalade, in the head, killing her. Levin had met Andrade at a club earlier in the evening but was not involved in the fight, officials said.
By the time he'd turned 20, Barros was already listed by the state as an "an armed career criminal" for a variety of gun-related violent crimes.
In addition to the reduced murder charge, which could get him 20 years, the jury found Barros guilty of assault and battery with a dangerous weapon and unlawful possession of a firearm, the DA's office says. He's scheduled for sentencing tomorrow morning.
Casimiro Barros, 23 and already an official "career criminal," faces life behind bars for his role in the death of the Kentucky woman in Dorchester on March 24, 2007.
Barros allegedly got into a gun battle with Manuel Andrade, 36, of Dorchester, outside a Geneva Avenue party where they had feuded. Levin, an innocent bystandar, was shot in the head. Andrade will be tried separately for murder. Prosecutors say Levin and friends met Andrade at a Tremont Street club and agreed to go with him to the after-hours party.
Barros is also charged with armed assault with intent to murder, aggravated assault and battery with a dangerous weapon and unlawful possession of a firearm.
Even as prosecutors were getting ready yesterday to arraign the alleged killers of Chiara Levin, police in Maryland were arresting somebody for an equally notorious 1995 murder in Dorchester.
The two cases might be indirectly related: The 1995 murder of Bobby Mendes, allegedly by Arnoldo Lopes, started a gang war in the Cape Verdean community that just never really ended.
Well, OK, they allow as how maybe the cops had something to do with the arrests but that:
.. The short press release from the BPD mirrors exactly the information we passed along to them after receiving a tip from someone in the community. ...
Casimiro Barros was an "armed career criminal" (quite an accomplishment for someone at the tender age of 20). He'd been arrested most recently in December for unlawful possession of a firearm - after he'd led police on a high-speed chase. And yet now he's charged (along with another alleged winner) in Chiara Levin's murder. Why wasn't he behind bars on the earlier charges? How many other ticking time bombs like him are walking around today?
An "armed career criminal" and another alleged gang member will be arraigned Monday on charges they killed Chiara Levin on March 24 during a shootout, prosecutors said today.
Levin, visiting from Kentucky, was shot in the head during an early morning shootout between Casimiro Barros, the alleged career criminal from Roxbury at just 21 and Manuel Andrade, 34, of Dorchester, according to Suffolk County District Attorney Daniel Conley. In a statement, Conley described the night of her death:
But not the alleged troublemaker who also wound up at Boston Medical Center around the same time as Levin, police say in a report that explains some of the events the morning she died:
... Upon deciding to leave, Ms. Levin and her two friends again accepted a ride from the three males, while inside the vehicle and about to leave the area, gunshots were fired at the vehicle.
Danville High grad gunned down in Boston - Danville Advocate-Messenger.
Photo from Chiara Levin's Facebook page.
The woman, 22, was found with a gunshot wound at Geneva Avenue and Westville Street around 4 a.m. Rushed to Boston Medical Center, where she was pronounced dead. Possibly related to a party in the area.
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