With Tuesday's guilty verdict handed down, the picture of what happened that night back in 2008 on the fields behind Revere High School between a group of off-duty police officers and gangsters has finally come into focus.
As came out in trial testimony, the officers had been drinking since leaving the shooting range at Fort Devens when Officers Soto, Franklin, and Talbot cracked open a few brews (with Soto driving). They continued to drink at local watering hole Margarita's, and then after that brought some alcohol to the bleachers behind Revere High School. This is where they would fatefully encounter Derek Lodie, who was cutting through the high school fields.
When the group saw Lodie, testimony states that the group began to harass him. In his testimony ex-Sergeant Franklin stated that, at most, they were just looking for a fistfight with Lodie, whom Talbot recognized from his work in the gang unit at Revere PD. During these taunts, Talbot yelled numerous things at Lodie, including "gangster," "slob," and "BK." Lodie, who was associated with Blood gang members, would have taken these statements as Talbot pledging allegiance to the Crips street gang (it should be noted here that rumors of hand signs have been going around - testimony during trial indicated that while off-duty Talbot would "clown around" and make gang symbols with his hands, but as far as it taking place that night, there's no testimony to support that). Slob is a put-down that Crips direct at Bloods, and BK stands for Blood Killer, another Crips identifier. Lodie, who believed that he was being targeted by a group of Crip gang members, called up some of his Blood friends, which included Robert Iacoviello.
After Lodie made the phone call to his gangster friends, Iacoviello showed up with Thomas Papandrea, who was the prosecution's main witness against Iacoviello, and Dararin "Johnny" Heang (James Heang's younger brother). At this point the gangster contingent began hurling insults back to the off-duty officers. When this began Talbot left the bleacher area to confront Lodie and his associates, despite several warnings and pleadings from the other officers and his fiance to stop. This is when Iacoviello pulled out a Hi Point 9mm that he brought with him and shot Talbot in the head, which would kill him hours later. The gangsters fled, with Officer Soto returning fire without hitting anyone.
I've already gone over what the officers did post-shooting, and now we know more about what Iacoviello and his friends did. Iacoviello returned to the party he left upon Johnny Heang receiving the call from Lodie and in the hours and days that followed enlisted the help of numerous people to help break down the Hi Point and get rid of other evidence, such as shoes and clothes. This is where Gia Nagy comes in; her DNA was found in the knot of a rubber glove holding pieces of the murder weapon. This is the only DNA/fingerprint evidence found on the murder weapon as the gun was heated with a blowtorch and Cloroxed after it was used to kill Talbot. However, the elder Heang was convicted of accessory after the fact for his role in breaking down the gun and depositing it in storm drains in Revere.
On top of all this, Iacoviello apparently confessed to the murder to a jailhouse confidant, Randy Furtado. Furtado got his sentence reduced from 5-7 years to 2.5 years on unrelated drug charges for his testimony in which he stated that Iacoviello told him that he fired at Talbot thinking he was a Crip and did not mean to hit him.
All in all, Robert Iacoviello was found guilty of second degree murder for being the triggerman, Derek Lodie pleaded guilty to accessory before the fact and received 8-12 years, Gia Nagy pleaded guilty to being an accessory after the fact and received 1-2 years, and James Heang was found guilty of accessory after the fact with Iacoviello. Iacoviello's attorney, who says that Iacoviello did not kill Talbot, says his client will appeal the verdict.
Both parties involved here were in the wrong. To pretend to be a rival gangster while looking for a fistfight with a kid who you know is associated with Bloods behind a public high school at 1:30am after you've been drinking for the majority of the evening shows incredibly bad judgment and, in this case, got Daniel Talbot killed. Did he deserve to be killed for his errors? Absolutely not, and that is why Robert Iacoviello will be behind bars for at least a decade and a half.
Photo - Iacoviello in court (Boston.com)
Despite proving to the entire country that he was not mature enough to be a police officer back in late July of last year, the Boston Police Department has just gotten around to letting ex-Officer Justin "Jungle Monkey" Barrett go. After what they call a "thorough" investigation, BPD announced last week that Barrett was terminated, effective February 5.
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