Girl’s grandmother heard shooting

The girl’s 23-year-old
ex-boyfriend is listed as a suspect.

By PATRICIA MEADE

VINDICATOR CRIME REPORTER

YOUNGSTOWN — Rose Yeager heard the shots that hit Misty White, her 14-year-old granddaughter.

“The shooting was around midnight. We heard it from here,” Yeager said, moving in her wheelchair on Richland Avenue to point to First Street, a few blocks away on the West Side.

“They were told to sit on the porch at her other grandmother’s on First Street and wait for Kevin [Bacher] to pick them up. But they walked down the street.”

Kevin Bacher is Misty’s 19-year-old uncle. He was going to give Misty and her girlfriend a ride to Yeager’s, where they were spending Saturday night.

The shooting took place around 12:15 a.m. Sunday at the end of First Street near the parking lot of the Holy Trinity Church social hall on Laird Avenue. Misty’s row-house apartment is west of the lot at the corner of Steel and First streets.

Misty remained in critical condition Monday at St. Elizabeth Health Center. Yeager said the girl was hit three times and one bullet remains lodged in her back.

Lavinna Manning, Misty’s 57-year-old maternal grandmother and guardian, said she is also raising the girl’s brother Steven, 13. Yeager, 56, has the third sibling, Christina, 15.

Manning described Misty as a good girl who had attended Volney Rogers Junior High but was doing home schooling on computer this year. “It’s tough raising a grandchild,” she said.

The girl’s parents, Steve Direnzo and Francis White, are both in prison, the grandmothers said. Francis White is expected to be released Oct. 19; Direnzo, in July 2008. Both were convicted of drug-related crimes.

Bacher said a shooter on foot opened fire when he, an 18-year-old male friend and Misty’s brother drove down to the social hall parking lot to pick up Misty and her girlfriend. Three others sat in a white SUV in the lot.

He said Misty and her girlfriend ran to his Camaro, and Misty was hit as she “dove into my car.”

Putting his thumb and forefinger an inch apart, Bacher said “one bullet came this close to hitting her brother. He was already in the car.” e uncle said his car was hit at least five times.

At least seven rounds were fired. Police collected casings from two handguns — a .40-caliber and 9mm.

Bacher, who was later given a gunshot residue test, said he didn’t have a gun.

All four suspects, Bacher said, wore white wave caps and white T-shirts and he believes one was Misty’s 23-year-old ex-boyfriend.

Police reports note that one of the officers on the scene Sunday had taken a report a couple months ago about the ex-boyfriend’s beating Misty “and he threatened to get her.”

Jail records show the ex-boyfriend was booked on a probation violation in June and then released on summons. He was indicted in August on a drug possession charge and is set for pretrial hearing Oct. 19 in Mahoning County Common Pleas Court.

Yeager said Misty and her mother were both seeing the 23-year-old man several months ago “and that’s when the trouble started.” She said Misty’s mother violated her parole and went back to prison for a while.

“We were petrified after what happened that the shooters would come here,” Yeager said from her wheelchair. “They must have been trying to kill everyone.”

meade@vindy.com