Mercer Prosecutor Joe Bocchini announces arrest of suspect in shooting homicide
A 19-year-old city resident has been charged with killing another man after an argument Jan. 12 in the 100 block of Fulton Street, police said Monday.
Willie Y. Figueroa, 19, was nabbed by U.S. Marshals on at 10:45 a.m. Friday and was being held by authorities here on $500,000 bail on a charge of attempted murder, reported Casey DeBlasio, spokeswoman for Mercer County Prosecutor Joseph Bocchini.
“We had a shooting on Fulton Street on Jan. 12, the victim of that shooting, Jose deJesus Rodriguez, succumbed to his injuries on Jan. 18 while at Capital Health Regional Medical Center (Helene Fuld), and we have arrested Mr. Figueroa,” said Detective Sgt. Chris Doyle.
Doyle confirmed that Rodriguez knew somebody in that block and stopped there, and was shot multiple times after getting into an argument with another man. Another police source told The Trentonian the victim had been shot 10 times, yet managed to survive for six days.
His death was the second homicide this year and the seventh since Dec. 15.
I’Kime Melvin was Trenton’s first homicide of 2012. The 32-year-old was stabbed to death in his Clearfield Avenue apartment on the Island section on Martin Luther King Jr. Day.
