BOSTON, Feb. 22, 2016—A 16-year-old Dorchester youth was arraigned on a murder charge today for the stabbing death of 15-year-old Deon Hopkins yesterday, Suffolk County District Attorney Daniel F. Conley said.
AMARI POPE (D.O.B. 10/5/99) was arraigned this afternoon in Dorchester Municipal Court. Assistant District Attorney Gregory Henning of the DA’s Senior Trial Unit recommended that he be held without bail. Judge Serge Georges granted that request.
Henning told the court that Hopkins and a teenage girl became involved in a verbal altercation near the intersection of Columbia Road and Devon Street at about 4:30 yesterday afternoon. Pope, who was also present, allegedly left the scene, went into his Columbia Road home, and returned with a kitchen knife.
In the moments that followed, Henning said, Pope stabbed the younger boy and pursued him across the street. Hopkins collapsed in front of a nearby market and surveillance video allegedly shows Pope circling his body still carrying the knife. Pope allegedly left the area and changed his clothing.
“The evidence gathered since Sunday afternoon suggests this was a verbal altercation that didn’t have to escalate to violence,” Conley said. “It’s made all the more tragic by the fact that the victim was just five weeks shy of his 16th birthday.”
A civilian witness who had incorrectly heard that the victim was shot called 911. Boston Police and Boston EMS responded to the scene and the victim was rushed to Boston Medical Center, where he died of a stab wound to the chest.
In the aftermath of the incident, Pope allegedly made statements to a family member that he “did something stupid.” The statements suggested that he had a violent altercation with the victim and may have killed him.
Those statements were relayed to Boston Police homicide detectives. Pope and an adult family member were transported to the Boston Police Homicide Unit, where the family member invoked Pope’s right to counsel. Additional homicide detectives interviewed witnesses and gathered additional evidence corroborating Pope’s statements.
Eliana Builes is the DA’s assigned victim-witness advocate. Pope was represented today by attorney David Apfel. He will return to court on March 30.
–30–
All defendants are presumed innocent until and unless proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.
