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Mom of victim takes stand

Testimony offers insight into shooting death of boy, 14, at friend’s home

YOUNGSTOWN — Bobbi Gray, mother of Logan Taylor, 14, testified Tuesday in Mahoning County Juvenile Court that she did not want Logan to sleep over at the home three doors away from Logan’s friend, Masiahs Gentry, on Nov. 11, and told Logan no.

But under questioning by Masiahs’ attorney, John Shultz, she agreed that the boys were both adamant that Logan should sleep over that night. Masiahs was 13 at the time. About 8 p.m. that night, she hugged her son, and Logan “said I love you and I’ll see you in the morning” as he left to spend the night, she said. She testified that Logan “thought (Masiahs) was his best friend.”

But Masiahs is now charged with murder and a gun specification in Logan’s death after Logan was found with a gunshot wound to the upper side of his head in Masiahs’ bedroom and died later at the hospital.

Judge Theresa Dellick called the proceeding a “bench” trial, meaning a trial without a jury. Because Masiahs was 13 at the time of the killing, Dellick did not have to bind the case over to the adult-level common pleas court and chose not to, said Anissa Modarelli, assistant county prosecutor.

The case will be resolved in juvenile court. The trial is not over. It will resume with more testimony today and apparently will include testimony from defense witnesses, Modarelli said.

Gray was emotional as she testified, and Jason Gray, Logan’s stepfather, visibly shook as he sat listening to Gray’s testimony and earlier testimony from the forensic pathologist from Cuyahoga County who carried out Logan’s autopsy.

The focus of the testimony from Gray, forensic pathologist Elizabeth Mooney and Mahoning County Coroner Dr. David Kennedy was that the science indicated that Logan’s death was a homicide, not a self-inflicted wound.

Bobbi Gray testified that Masiahs’ mother told Jason Gray that Logan shot himself. She said this when she went to the Gray home to tell them about the shooting, Bobbi Gray testified.

Mooney’s testimony indicated that she did not find “stippling” on the skin of Logan’s head. Stippling is “a pattern in skin that can result from a gunshot wound in which burning powder hits the skin and causes small burns or stippling patterns,” according to the Oxfordreference.com website.

Mooney said the lack of stippling is a factor used to determine how far away the shot was fired from the person who the bullet hit.

During later testimony, Kennedy testified that he ruled that Logan died of a gunshot wound to the head and that the death was a homicide based on Logan having been “shot by another person.” He concluded that based on the gunshot not being fired “in close proximity” to the victim. Kennedy said he based that ruling on Moooney’s autopsy report and its finding that there was no stippling on the body.

Shultz asked Mooney and Kennedy about the effect of a “barrier” between the fired gun and the skin of the gunshot victim, and both agreed there are situations in which something like a sheet or even hair can prevent the gunpowder from making contact with the skin.

When Kennedy was asked how much investigating he did personally into the case, he said he looked at the autopsy report, the police reports and the medical reports, but gave the most weight to the autopsy report.

Shultz asked Kennedy if his ruling of homicide was “based on information you got second-hand, and you are not aware of what it was based on.”

Kennedy replied, “Correct.”

Patrolman Steven Gibson of the Youngstown Police Department testified he was on patrol when the first information came to him through his mobile-data terminal in his cruiser Nov. 11. He was only several blocks away from Lucius Avenue and thinks he arrived at the home within a minute.

He went into the home and walked up to the second floor, where he found Masiahs “hysterical,” Gibson said. Masiashs said his friend “was shot or had been shot,” Gibson said.

Masiahs directed the officer into a bedroom, where Logan was in a gaming chair on the floor. Logan was slumped, and the officer moved the boy to see where he was wounded. Gibson did not “initially” see a gun, he testified.

Gibson asked Masiahs where the gun was and Masiahs directed the officer to a closet on the right near the entrance to the bedroom. Gibson found a gun on the floor of the closet. Gibson said he does not remember if the closet door was closed or open.

Most of the other items in the room were either straight ahead or to the left, Gibson testified under the questioning of Modarelli.

If Masiahs is convicted of murder, he could serve time in an Ohio Department of Youth Services facility, a type of juvenile lockup, until the age of 21. If found to be a serious youthful offender, he also could be transferred to adult prison to continue his sentence, according to Vindicator files.

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