Blayn Jiggetts and Jason Aquino—two of the three men implicated in the May 2009 Kirkland House shooting—have made an agreement with prosecutors to plead guilty to a lesser charge in exchange for cooperating with the district attorney’s office.
Originally charged with first-degree murder, Aquino now faces the lesser charge of manslaughter after agreeing to cooperate with Middlesex District Attorney Gerard T. Leone, Jr. ’85 in a case against Jabrai Jordan Copney—who allegedly shot Justin Cosby—according to the Boston Globe.
Aquino now faces a maximum sentence of 20 years in jail after making the agreement with prosecutors.
Although Jiggetts will also face prison time, George Murphy, Jiggetts’s attorney, declined to comment to the Globe on the nature of his client’s sentencing.
Jiggetts took the stand Friday against Brittany J. Smith, a former Harvard student and Copney’s former girlfriend, at the Middlesex Superior Court, according to the Globe. During her arraignment last March, Smith pleaded not guilty to charges of accessory after the fact of murder and several other charges related to the shooting.
At Friday’s hearing, her defense attorney, John Osler, tried to get the court to throw out all criminal charges against her, according to the Globe.
Smith originally signed a non-prosecution agreement in exchange for agreeing to divulge everything she knew about the shooting. Prosecutors allege that Smith withheld information related to the case and therefore reneged on her agreement, the Globe wrote.
Aquino, Jiggetts, and Copney all previously pleaded not guilty to the murder.
Copney allegedly shot Justin Cosby, a Cambridge Rindge and Latin graduate who did not attend Harvard, on May 18, 2009 during what investigators have called a failed “drug rip.”
Leone said in 2009 that Copney, Aquino, and Jiggetts had initially planned to steal drugs and money from Cosby.
Cosby allegedly sold drugs to Harvard students.
Police reportedly recovered a pound of marijuana and approximately $1,000 from the crime scene, Leone said.
The four men met in the basement of Kirkland’s J-entryway shortly before 5 p.m. that night.
According to a police report, a struggle broke out between Cosby and the three suspects. Jiggetts allegedly drew a gun, which he then passed to Copney.
Copney allegedly fired three shots, one of which fatally wounded Cosby.
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Kirkland Shooting Suspect Jason Aquino Pleads Not Guilty to Murder ChargesJason Aquino, 23, one of the three men implicated in the May 2009 Kirkland House shooting, pled not guilty to charges of murder, armed robbery, and intimidation of a juror and was held without bail Tuesday.
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Two Defendants To Face Trial in April; Two Likely To Plead GuiltyAs legal proceedings move forward against the four defendants charged with participating in the 2009 killing in the basement of Kirkland House, two defendants plan to plead guilty while the two others—the man who allegedly pulled the trigger and the Harvard student who is charged with aiding the murderers—are set to stand trial next month.
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Prosecutors Say Shooter Lured Victim to Kirkland BasementProsecutors said today that Jabrai Jordan Copney lured Justin Cosby, the victim of the May 2009 shooting in Kirkland House, into a basement where he was shot during a drug rip gone wrong.
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Kirkland Trial Day 7: Blayn Jiggetts Says It Wasn’t Worth ItBlayn Jiggetts—the defendant in the Kirkland shooting case who allegedly brought and loaded the gun that killed Justin Cosby—began his testimony yesterday in the trial of alleged shooter Jabrai Jordan Copney.
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Copney Awaits Jury's Verdict as Kirkland Shooting Trial EndsThe closing arguments in the Kirkland murder trial yesterday were characterized by sharply different versions of the same story as the defense blamed the shooting on another man, calling him a “homicidal maniac,” and the state responded by likening that claim to “fantasy.”