3rd Conviction in Slaying of 3 Newark College Students

A third man has been convicted in the gruesome 2007 execution-style slayings of three Newark college friends. A fourth victim survived. At least two of the college students were gay.

A jury debated four days before returning a guilty verdict against gang member Alexander Alfaro. Alfaro was found guilty of the murders of all three victims. He faces a maximum penalty of life imprisonment when he is sentenced on May 19,  reports CNN.

Terrance Aeriel, Iofemi Hightower and Dashon Harvey were killed August 4, 2007 when they were shot execution style. Aeriel's sister was shot and sexually assaulted but survived. Harvey and Hightower were openly gay. The friends "planned to drive together "to New York City the next morning to attend a black Gay Pride event. Hightower, a lesbian, was also sexually assaulted. All four victims were enrolled or about to be enrolled at Delaware State University.

Alfaro is the second of  three adults and three teens to be tried for the violent gang initiation. His half-brother, Rodolfo Godinez, was convicted last year and a third man, Melvin Jovel, pleaded guilty. They are serving life terms. Three others await trial.

In 2007, Rod 2.0 reported one of the teen suspects attended high school with one of the gay victims—and this may have been among the reasons the victims were targeted. Prosecutors declined to file hate crime charges because the victims' families "did not want" the deceased identified as gay.

R20's complete coverage HERE.

Comments

[Derrick from Philly]

I'm glad that you care enough, Rod, to keep us informed about the aftermath of this horrible event.

It's the race of the victims which makes this no longer of interest on other Gay blogs, isn't it? Of course.

The families of the two Gay teens would not try for harsher sentences because it may have required admitting their "loved ones" were Gay? What kind of families are those? The kind not worth being a member of.

And it's hard to believe that New Jersey prosecutors couldn't go on and use a hate-crime prosecution without the family's conscent. Maybe the prosecutors didn't feel there was enough evidence in these torture executions to prove that the motive was anti-Gay hatred.

But the reaction of "Gay America" to this horrible crime is very telling. These torture executions were just as vicious as the Matthew Shepard torture murder... but obviously not as important to "Gay America".