Documents in city shooting unsealed
Jamaal Greene, front, and Tavian Hooper are escorted into the Washington County Courthouse by sheriff’s deputies June 24.
Court documents unsealed Tuesday supporting homicide and other charges against Tavian Hooper, 18, and Jamaal Greene, 18, both of Washington, in the shooting death of 19-year-old Alexis Barnett outlined witness accounts given to city police three months ago.
A girl, identified only as a juvenile witness, allegedly told police she tried to dissuade Hooper from shooting Edwin “Cheeno” Rivera. Barnett died from a bullet wound and her friend, Jasmine Young, was also injured in the incident. Rivera was unscathed.
Police said Greene was driving a small silver vehicle with Hooper and the girl May 4 when they passed Rivera – with whom the pair had “bad blood” – in a group of five people, including Barnett and Young, 21.
When Hooper and Greene spotted Rivera, 25, they allegedly made hand gestures mimicking a handgun and “sounds of ‘boom, boom,'” police said. Greene turned the car around to pursue Rivera, who fled and hid when he saw the pair.
At some point, the girl said she and Hooper exited the car. When she couldn’t dissuade him from targeting Rivera, she walked away as Hooper was seen walking down Maple Avenue toward Bruce Street.
According to police, a woman who was with Rivera and others said their group went to a house on Bruce Street after they spotted the car Greene was driving. The woman said they left soon after and headed for Maple Terrace, where Young lives. The woman was behind the rest of the group, but started running in their direction when she heard two or three gunshots, police said.
She told police she passed Hooper, who was wearing a dark hoodie, running in the opposite direction.
Barnett and Young were taken to Washington Hospital, where Barnett was pronounced dead. Police were called about 9:40 p.m.
Hooper is charged with criminal homicide, aggravated assault, reckless endangerment, attempted homicide, conspiracy and a firearm violation. Greene is charged with criminal homicide and conspiracy.
The juvenile witness allegedly told police she got in a car with a separate woman who later picked up Hooper at a location in the city’s West End. Hooper allegedly told them he shot Rivera. The woman told him he instead shot two women.
He allegedly asked the woman to retrieve the gun from where he stashed it in some bushes, but the woman refused to go to the area of the shooting, police said.
Rivera testified July 1 at a preliminary hearing for Hooper and Greene but did not say he saw Hooper fire a weapon. In their affidavit, police don’t quote any of the witnesses as saying they saw Hooper shooting, either.
The affidavits and other documents were sealed by a judge’s order when charges were filed June 9. The 60-day order expired Tuesday.
Ryan Tutera, Hooper’s attorney, declined to comment on the allegations in the affidavit, but said his client is presumed innocent and the prosecution is “going to have a lot to deal with on their hands with their quote-unquote star witness, Edwin Rivera. And there’s a lot he testified to (at the preliminary hearing) that doesn’t comport with what the affidavit says.”
Rivera appeared before District Judge Jay Weller Tuesday in a separate case on reckless endangerment and other charges. Police allege he was responsible for an incident in which a 19-year-old woman was shot in the foot at a motel in July after Rivera suggested a game of Russian roulette.
Assistant District Attorney Jerry Moschetta confirmed juvenile allegations against the girl who was with Hooper and Greene before the shooting. He said the allegations, some of which are felonies, didn’t include homicide or conspiracy to commit homicide but were “related to hindering apprehension of the individuals involved in the homicide.”
Moschetta said the juvenile case “has been heard by the court and resolved” but declined to give details about its outcome.