Local Arrests in Newark Slayings
Man, Found in Md., Is Called Ringleader

By Daniela Deane and Matt Zapotosky
Washington Post Staff Writers
Sunday, August 19, 2007; A01

A key suspect in the brutal killings of three college students in Newark was arrested early yesterday in Oxon Hill, where authorities found the 24-year-old Nicaraguan man among a group drinking beer and getting tattooed in a filthy apartment furnished with little more than mattresses on the floor.

Twenty minutes later, police arrested his 16-year-old half brother in the basement of a Woodbridge townhouse as the intense manhunt in the execution-style killings moved to the Washington immigrant community, authorities said.

Authorities said the suspects -- Rodolfo Godinez and the teenager, who is not being identified because he is to be charged as a juvenile -- were arrested on fugitive warrants for their involvement in the grisly Aug. 4 killings.

Godinez is believed to be a ringleader in the killings that shocked Newark and the rest of the nation with their incomprehensible brutality, authorities said. Police have said the students were forced to kneel against a wall behind an elementary school before being shot in the head. Cellphones and jewelry were taken from them, and two were slashed in the face with either a knife or a machete.

Although authorities in New Jersey have said they have found no gang link to the killings, a witness to Godinez's arrest said the man talked about being in MS-13, a notorious gang with roots in El Salvador that operates in a handful of metropolitan areas across the United States, including the Washington region. And law enforcement sources in the Washington area said they believe there is a possibility of gang involvement in the killings.

The men are wanted in connection with the killings of Terrance Aeriel, 18, and Dashon Harvey and Iofemi Hightower, both 20. Aeriel's sister, Natasha, 19, was shot in the head in the attack but survived. The Aeriels and Harvey were students at Delaware State University, and Hightower planned to enroll there this fall.

Godinez was arrested at Riverside Plaza apartments on Oxon Hill Road by about a dozen officers from federal, state and local agencies, said Robert Fernandez, commander of the Capital Area Regional Fugitive Task Force, who participated in the arrest.

Fernandez said 10 Hispanic males were in the three-bedroom, two-bath apartment when officers stormed in, guns drawn. He said the apartment had almost no furniture besides a "torn-up couch, a small TV on a milk crate and a bunch of mattresses on the floor." He said the apartment, which he described as dirty with clothes thrown everywhere, looked vacant.

"There was a tattoo gun on the kitchen counter with some ink spilled around it," Fernandez said. He said that one of the men had a half-finished tattoo but that it was unclear what the men were tattooing on one another.

Neighbor Norma Douglas, who watched the raid with her daughter through her door's peephole, said some of the men whom police handcuffed and took away lived at the apartment; others she had never seen. According to Fernandez, some of the men said they were staying at the apartment temporarily while working construction jobs in the area.

A man who was in the apartment at the time of the arrest said that Godinez and a friend had shown up about 11 a.m. Thursday and that Godinez was drinking beer and tattooing some of the other men.

The man said Godinez talked about being a member of MS-13.

He said that when police took Godinez away, he yelled, "MS-13 forever." Police could not confirm the report.

Godinez's half brother was arrested shortly afterward in the basement of a townhouse on Grist Mill Terrace in Woodbridge, police said. Prince William County police said three other Hispanic men were also arrested in the Woodbridge raid and charged with obstruction of justice for giving false information to detectives.

A neighbor on Grist Mill Terrace, who asked not to be identified because of safety concerns, said the couple who own the townhouse said about a month ago that they were considering renting out their basement. A week later, the neighbor said he began seeing three Hispanic teenagers coming and going.

Authorities believe the half brothers are from Newark and had come to the Washington area to hide out from the massive manhunt, which spanned the East Coast.

Godinez has been charged with three counts of murder, one count of attempted murder, four counts of robbery, two weapons counts and one count of conspiracy to commit robbery, said Carolyn Murray, an Essex County, N.J., assistant prosecutor. The 16-year-old will initially be charged as a juvenile with similar crimes, she said.

Deputy U.S. Marshal Bill Sorukas said authorities began to suspect a few days ago that the half brothers were hiding out in the Washington area. "We were looking at several different locations for 36 to 48 hours before we isolated the apartment in Oxon Hill," he said. "Once we had Godinez in custody, we identified where the remaining suspect might be."

Fernandez said the investigation first led authorities to Prince William and then spread to Oxon Hill. He said that authorities had been chasing every lead and that the lead investigator on the case had not slept in 48 hours.

"For 24 hours a day, seven days a week, for the last two weeks, we've been out there using all the tools in our toolbox," Garry McCarthy, Newark's police director, said at a news conference there yesterday afternoon. "We're using technological means, we're using old-fashioned gumshoe police work, knocking on doors, interviewing confidential informants, following up on lead after lead after lead."

Godinez is being held in the Prince George's County jail, and his half brother is at the Prince William jail pending extradition to New Jersey, authorities said.

Five people have been arrested in the case. Authorities are looking for a sixth suspect. They say robbery appeared to be the motive in the killings.

Fernandez said authorities identified the half brothers as being involved in the case after three arrests were made in Newark.

Within a week of the shootings, police had arrested two 15-year-olds, and a 28-year-old illegal immigrant from Peru had turned himself in to Newark Mayor Cory A. Booker. All have been charged with first-degree murder and attempted murder.

Godinez was arrested in 2002 after an alleged robbery and stabbing outside an Irvington, N.J., bar. He was charged with aggravated assault and robbery, then jumped his $50,000 bail, according to the Newark Star-Ledger.

Essex County sheriff's officers did not find him and stopped looking in 2005, when a woman who answered his phone said he had left the country, Essex County Sheriff Armando Fontoura told the newspaper.

Jose Carranza, the other adult charged in the case, was awaiting trial on assault and child-rape charges at the time of the Newark shootings. He had been released on $150,000 bail.

James Harvey, the father of victim Dashon Harvey, attended the Newark news conference and stood quietly listening, looking solemn.

"I'm very pleased that they're able to bring them to justice," he said later. "It should be a call to society that a crime such as this, no one should get away with it."

Staff writers Robin Shulman, Keith L. Alexander, Theresa Vargas, Allan Lengel and Nick Miroff and staff researcher Magda Jean-Louis contributed to this report. Shulman reported from Newark.