Teen could be sentenced to death for Fourth of July shooting in Raleigh, judge says

A Wake County judge told a teenager he could be sentenced to death or spend the rest of his life in prison if he is convicted of first-degree murder for an Independence Day shooting that left one man dead and three others injured in downtown Raleigh.

Curtis Hart Rainey of Raleigh appeared in court Friday, when a judge ordered him to be held without bail and to have no contact with the 16-year-old who is also charged in the crime.

District Court Judge Ned Mangum appointed an attorney from the Capital Defender’s Office to represent Rainey at the request of the public defender in court with the teen on Friday.

That request led the judge to tell the teen he could face the harshest possible penalty, though there have been questions about whether Rainey was 17 or 18 at the time of the shooting. People who are younger than 18 when they commit a crime cannot face the death penalty.

Records with the Raleigh/Wake City-County Bureau of Identification list Rainey as 18, but records with the N.C. Department of Corrections list his date of birth as July 22, 1999, which would make him 17.

A second accused teen, 16-year-old Kenneth Edward Watts Jr., appeared before Mangum on Thursday. Investigators took Rainey into custody hours later near Kaplan Drive in West Raleigh, police said.

Gunshots rang out around 10:40 p.m. Tuesday near a McDonald’s restaurant at the intersection of South Wilmington and East South streets. One of the four shooting victims – Raheem Khary Lawrence McAllister, 18, of Bellingham Circle – was taken to WakeMed, where he later died. The other three – two men ages 19 and 20 and a 35-year-old woman – were transported to WakeMed, where they were all treated for their injuries and released, police reported.

Police have not said who they believe fired the shot that killed McAllister, and they have not disclosed a motive for the shootings.

Diane Powell, founder and director of Justice NC, a nonprofit that mentors young people in jail, said she thinks the violence is related to the Bloods and Crips gangs.

Mekhi Alante Lucky, 20, of Raleigh was struck by a bullet and suffered a broken arm.

“I don’t know why they started shooting,” Lucky said Friday. “It was the Fourth of July.”

Rainey was handcuffed and outfitted in striped orange-and-white jail garb as he was led into the courtroom Friday.

Rainey and Watts both have had previous run-ins with the law.

Rainey pleaded guilty June 15 in Greene County to injury to personal property after he was charged with felony breaking and entering into a motor vehicle and larceny after breaking and entering, state records show. He was sentenced to 18 months of probation and was ordered to perform 24 hours of community service.

Watts had pending charges for trespassing and misdemeanor possession of marijuana, according to state records.

In addition to the first-degree murder charge from July 4, Watts was also charged with two counts of assault with a deadly weapon with intent to kill inflicting serious injury and misdemeanor assault with a deadly weapon. He is too young to face the death penalty.

This story was originally published July 7, 2017 at 4:34 PM with the headline "Teen could be sentenced to death for Fourth of July shooting in Raleigh, judge says."