Vandalism to be added to charges against Warren teens

Staff report

WARREN

Vandalism charges will be filed next week against five teens who purportedly went on a crime spree early Tuesday that included shooting a 20-year-old pedestrian in the eye with a BB gun.

The five, females age 18, 16 and 16, and males age 16 and 14, are all charged with aggravated robbery for stealing the cellphone of a 20-year-old Niles man and shooting him in the eye.

The man, who was walking to the apartment where he lived near the Mahoning Avenue Giant Eagle at the time, has had multiple surgeries in an attempt to save the eye, said Patrick Marsico, a Warren police detective. The BB lodged in the victim’s sinus cavity, police said.

The 18-year-old, Sa’Dierra Lowery of Genesee Avenue, was arraigned in Warren Municipal Court on Tuesday, and the juveniles were sent to the Trumbull County Juvenile Detention Center. Four of the teens lived in the same house on Oak Street Southwest, Marsico said.

All will be charged. They are accused of firing four BB guns that same morning starting about 12:30 a.m. and ending about 4:30 a.m., Marsico said.

They are responsible for breaking a plate-glass window at CBS Barber Shop on Highland Avenue Southwest, hitting a home on the North End of the city and hitting a variety of other structures, Marsico said.

All five were taken into custody after the manager of Giant Eagle called police at 4:24 a.m., saying juveniles had left the store without paying for a $25 bottle of liquor.

The manager described the car they were driving, enabling a police officer to spot them driving south on Mahoning Avenue and make an arrest. They had four BB guns in the car and the cellphone belonging to the victim.

While questioning the teens about the liquor theft, officers learned of the assault on the pedestrian, who said the teens struck him in the face and back with shots from BB guns.