Lowell man convicted of Boston lady’s 2020 homicide

Crime

Xavier DeJesus, 23, was discovered responsible by a Middlesex Superior Court docket jury on prices of second diploma homicide and a number of other firearm prices, in response to officers.

Carmen Athena Nieves’s daughter Deija Mendez was murdered. She is photographed exterior of her Mattapan house, with {a photograph} of her daughter. (Jonathan Wiggs/Globe Workers)

Greater than three years after a 23-year-old Boston lady was shot and killed in Lowell, her assassin has been convicted, officers stated Friday.

Xavier DeJesus, 23, was discovered responsible Wednesday by a Middlesex Superior Court docket jury on prices of second diploma homicide and a number of other firearm prices, in response to a press release from Middlesex District Legal professional Marian T. Ryan’s workplace.

DeJesus might be sentenced on Monday by Middlesex Superior Court docket Decide Kenneth Salinger, in response to the assertion.

On June 23, 2020, Deija Mendez, 23, was shot and killed whereas she was sitting within the driver’s seat of a automotive on Coral Avenue in Lowell, in response to officers.

Police stated she was shot within the head and died on the scene.

The investigation discovered that Mendez and one other man drove to the house on Coral Avenue to choose up a automotive when a struggle broke out about who it belonged to.

DeJesus left the house, obtained a gun, and got here again earlier than fatally capturing Mendez, in response to officers. 

One witness stated DeJesus referred to as out Mendez’s identify earlier than open firing so she “would flip and take a look at him when he did it,” in response to The Lowell Solar.

“Now two lives are destroyed … two households are destroyed,” Carmen Nieves, Mendez’s mom, advised The Lowell Solar.

“Individuals must know who she was,” Nieves advised the paper.