Derrick Catchings charged as adult in shooting of north Minneapolis teen
Derrick Deangelo Catchings, a 16-year-old from Brooklyn Park, will be tried as an adult in the murder of a teenager slain on his bike last summer in north Minneapolis, according to the Hennepin County Attorney's Office.
Derrick Deangelo Catchings is one of two teenagers charged in the murder of 13-year-old Rayjon Gomez.
Catchings has been in jail since last September on a separate case, and made his first court appearance Thursday for the first-degree murder charges. His bail has been set at $2 million.
Catchings is the second teenager to be charged in the August 24 murder of Rayjon Gomez, a 13-year-old who was shot while riding his bike in a North Side alley around 9:00 p.m. Another boy was also struck by a bullet, but survived. Gomez was one of three teenagers to be murdered in a month last summer in the area, evoking a combination of grief and anger from residents -- a little too similar to the unrest among neighbors after the recent murder of Nizzel George, a 5-year-old who was tragically shot and killed while sleeping on his grandmother's couch last week.
A grand jury indicted Catchings in March, but because of his age -- he was 15 at the time of Gomez's murder -- the court documents remained sealed until earlier this week, when he was certified to be tried as an adult. Catchings faces a total of six charges: two counts of first-degree murder, and four counts of attempted murder.
The second alleged killer, 17-year-old Donquarius Davon Copeland, was indicted earlier this year. He faces charges of first-degree murder, first-degree murder while committing a drive-by shooting, two counts of attempted first-degree murder, and two counts of attempted first-degree murder while committing a drive-by shooting.
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