Roxbury man, 18, linked to '05 killing

Joseph A. Wilson Sr. stared across the courtroom yesterday at the slightly built teenager in the big white T-shirt, and for a few moments, the teenager and Wilson locked eyes.

Suddenly, Etanis Cumba ducked behind a low wall, out of Wilson's eyesight.

This ended the first encounter between the father of the murder victim and the man charged with killing his son.

In West Roxbury Municipal Court, Cumba, 18, of Roxbury , pleaded not guilty yesterday to a first-degree murder charge in the slaying of Joseph A. Wilson Jr. of Sudbury . Suffolk County prosecutors said the slaying took place Oct. 2, 2005, at an off-campus party held by students from the Wentworth Institute of Technology in a Huntington Avenue apartment building.

The party was also attended by residents of the neighboring Mission Park housing development.

Wilson, according to his family and prosecutors, attended the party at the invitation of a host, a longtime friend of the 20-year-old, who graduated from Lincoln-Sudbury High School in 2003.

According to Suffolk Assistant District Attorney Mark A. Hallal, the party in the Huntington Avenue building was uneventful until after midnight, when Wilson and three men from Mission Park got into an argument that ended with handshakes among the parties.

But about a half-hour later, Cumba allegedly came in wearing a red bandanna across his face, accompanied by two other people. According to Hallal, Cumba said there was ``some problem with a tall guy." Wilson was 6-foot-1, Hallal said.

Cumba allegedly tossed a beer at Wilson and a friend and then pulled out a gun and pointed it at the two men. Cumba started leaving the party, and Wilson was standing with his arms over his head in what Hallal called a ``position of surrender."

Hallal told the court that this was when Cumba allegedly stabbed Wilson numerous times in the chest.

One stab sliced through Wilson's heart, Hallal said.

Cumba's court-appointed defense lawyer, John Fitzpatrick, urged Judge Kenneth Desmond to set bail at $5,000 cash.

He argued that the case against his client lacked ``hard evidence." He also said that only one person has identified Cumba as the killer, and he noted that seven months have passed since Wilson's slaying.

``It's not an overwhelming case," Fitzpatrick said. ``There seems to be not very much hard proof" linking Cumba to the slaying. Desmond, however, ordered Cumba held without bail.

As Hallal recited the evidence, some of the 10 Wilson family members attending the proceeding wept. As the arraignment began, Cumba stood up in the prisoner's dock.

Cumba later could be seen weeping as he looked toward his mother, Rosa, who sat in the front row of the courtroom, crying as well. ``My son, he is a good boy," Rosa Cumba said outside the courthouse before declining further comment.

The elder Wilson and his wife, Bronwen Wilson, spoke proudly of the oldest of their three children.

As a high school student, they said, their son started a masonry business that was so successful that the elder Wilson sometimes worked for his son.

``It's been a rough road for us," Joseph Wilson said. ``We are constantly looking for him . . . It's like we are on a ghost walk. We just walk around in a daze."