2 Roxbury teens arrested in sixth-grader's death

DA: Boy mistaken for gang member

Luis Gerena was 13 when he was shot and killed in Jamaica Plain.

Wendy Jiminian went to her son's grave Wednesday, lighted a candle, and prayed that police would find whoever killed the 13-year-old.

Twenty four hours later, her prayers were answered.

Yesterday, the Suffolk district attorney's office called her at home. Police had arrested two Roxbury teenagers for the killing of Luis Gerena, who was gunned down in January 2007 as he walked home from the Jackson Square MBTA station in Jamaica Plain.

"Thank God," Jiminian said in a telephone interview moments after she learned the news. "I'm happy, but I'm sad, because they killed him."

Nurudeen Alabi, 19, and Darrell Rodrigues, 17, shot Gerena in the torso and back because they mistakenly believed he was a rival gang member, Suffolk District Attorney Daniel F. Conley said. The two will be arraigned on murder charges today in Roxbury District Court. Both have been detained on other charges and could not be reached for comment.

"By every single account that we've uncovered, Luis was really a good kid," Conley said. "He had no association with gangs."

That January evening, Luis had stayed late at Clarence R. Edwards Middle School, where he was in the sixth grade, to do extra work, his family said. He then visited his girlfriend in Charlestown, before heading back home.

It was just after 7 p.m. when he left the MBTA station, which lies between the turfs of two rival gangs from Roxbury and Jamaica Plain. Gerena was in a sort of "no man's land," Conley said.

Alabi and Rodrigues, who are believed to be members of the Roxbury gang, confronted him, shot him, stole his cellphone, and ran away, Conley said.

The sixth-grader's death shook the city. At the time, Luis was the youngest homicide victim in Boston in at least two years, and his killing occurred less than a month after his classmate, Emmanuel Saintil, 14, was fatally shot in Mattapan as he walked home.

Alyson Georgopoulos, Luis's 22-year-old cousin, went to St. Michael's Cemetery near Forest Hills Wednesday with Luis's mother and two sisters. The women took photos of the grave and reminisced about Luis, a quiet youth who loved hip hop fashion and chatting online.

"It was such a beautiful day," Georgopoulos said. "We were trying to bring back memories. . . . We were just praying that we'd get justice. We just wanted justice, that's all. We don't care who they are, why they did it; we just want them in jail."

The arrests have given the family some measure of relief.

"It's like a piece of my heart closed over," Georgopoulos said. "I had a hole in my heart because of this. Now, I can sleep at night and know that he's going to rest in peace."

Rodrigues is in the custody of the Department of Youth Services on prior criminal charges, which were not publicly available yesterday because he was a juvenile at the time of the arrest.

Alabi is serving a six-month sentence in the Suffolk County House of Correction for drug possession. He was sentenced in December after he pleaded guilty to marijuana possession, according to Roxbury District Court records.

Police Commissioner Edward F. Davis and Conley said they were able to issue arrest warrants for the suspects because of "extensive cooperation" from witnesses.

Conley said a grand jury is still investigating the slaying and hearing testimony from witnesses.

Georgopoulos said she anticipates that relatives will pack the courtroom at today's arraignment.

"We still to this day wake up, and it's the same feeling," she said. "Every day, we look at his picture and say: 'Why? Why Luis?' "

Maria Cramer can be reached at mcramer@globe.com.