The 16-year-old Haverhill boy police say walked up to a Lawrence man and allegedly shot him in the face during an attempted robbery on Ashworth Terrace last weekend was on parole and wearing a GPS ankle monitor.
Edison Manzueta booking photograph (Courtesy Haverhill Police Department)
Arraigned on an armed assault to murder charge in Lawrence juvenile court Tuesday, the boy is being held without bail ahead of a Friday dangerousness hearing, District Attorney Jonathan W. Blodgett’s office told WHAV.
As WHAV previously reported, the gunfire took place Sunday, Oct. 13 around 6 p.m. in the city’s Mount Washington neighborhood. Haverhill Police Officer Dan Trocki, working alongside the Lawrence Police Department and Massachusetts State Police, was dispatched to Lawrence General Hospital shortly after 6 p.m. to meet with a male victim who sustained a gunshot wound to the face.
During an interview with the man’s 20-year-old girlfriend, Trocki learned that the couple came to Haverhill from their home in Lawrence to smoke marijuana. According to the woman, her 21-year-old boyfriend was shot while the couple was sitting in their parked car on Ashworth Terrace.
She reached into her backseat to grab a tray they use to roll marijuana, and the next thing she saw, according to police, was a silver sedan with two dark-skinned males. She heard one shot and saw the car speed away. As blood was pouring down her boyfriend’s face, the woman drove straight to Lawrence General Hospital. He was later transferred to Lahey Burlington for treatment of life-threatening injuries.
In a subsequent police interview, the woman changed her story to say her boyfriend was actually in Haverhill to sell drugs to someone with the street name “Beetlejuice.” She told police “Beetlejuice”—later identified by police as 19-year-old Edison Manzueta—walked up to their car with the Haverhill teen, who allegedly pulled out a gun and shot him during an attempted robbery.
Police were able to identify the alleged shooter through his Facebook page, which is said to contain “multiple gang-related posts and pictures of him throwing gang signs.”
When the 16-year-old was being booked after being arrested on a warrant, police realized he was wearing a GPS monitoring device and that he was on parole from the Department of Youth Services.
Also arrested on a warrant, Manzueta was held without bail by Judge Stephen Abany Oct. 15 on a charge of armed assault to murder. He next appears in court Oct. 22.