15-year-old will be tried as adult in Niles slaying

WARREN — Jacob Larosa, 15, will be tried as an adult in the death of Marie Belcastro, 94, Trumbull County Prosecutor Dennis Watkins announced this afternoon.

Authorities believe Larosa killed Belcastro Tuesday afternoon at her Cherry Street home in Niles.

Larosa had a detention hearing in the Trumbull Count Juvenile Court Wednesday morning and was due for a second hearing there early next week. Magistrate Monte Horton ordered that Larosa be held in the Juvenile Detention Center, said Jack Silbaugh, Horton’s bailiff.

Watkins said Chris Becker and Stanley Elkins, assistant Trumbull County prosecutors, will handle the matter in juvenile court “and will be taking all necessary steps under the law to accomplish such transfer.” Becker handles adult criminal cases. Elkins handles juvenile criminal cases.

Larosa and his family lived a few houses away from Belcastro on Lafayette Avenue. His sister, Kaela Larosa, told reporters Tuesday that her brother had just gotten out of the Juvenile Justice Center earlier Tuesday and had been gone from home a couple months.

Larosa's next-door neighbor, Charles Winwood, said Wednesday he put up video cameras around his house shortly after he moved in three years ago because of Larosa.

Winwood said he captured video of LaRosa in the alley behind his house in the area of Belcastro's house on Tuesday afternoon, and he gave the video to Niles police.

He has also used the video to capture LaRosa breaking into his house on two occasions and boarded up the porch in front of his house to keep the youth from sleeping there.