YOUNGSTOWN — The boy, now 15, convicted of shooting and killing his 14-year-old friend during a sleepover at his South Side home Nov. 11, 2023, was sentenced to 3 1/2 years in an Ohio Department of Youth Services juvenile correctional facility.

Following a two-day trial last July in Mahoning County Juvenile Court, Judge Theresa Dellick found the boy delinquent — the juvenile equivalent of guilty — of reckless homicide and a gun specification. The boy was 13 at the time of the shooting, turning 14 about 3 1/2 months later.

He was sentenced last August.

Reckless homicide is a third-degree felony, and the gun specification requires a mandatory three-year sentence. In an Aug. 21, 2024, judgment entry, Dellick ordered that the boy, then 14, serve a minimum of six months in a state correctional facility on the reckless homicide and three years on the gun specification with credit for time served in the Martin P. Joyce Juvenile Justice Center lockup while awaiting the completion of his case.

He cannot be held in juvenile custody past his 21st birthday, the entry states.

While awaiting transfer to the ODYS, a multidisciplinary assessment of the boy was going to be carried out for the purposes of implementing the ODYS re-entry grant monitoring program, the entry states.

“Upon discharge from the ODYS to parole status, the student will be under case management, together with the ODYS, the entry states.

The boy shot Logan Taylor in the head in the defendant’s bedroom the morning after Logan had a sleepover at the boy’s home on East Lucius Avenue on the South Side, the Sweeney ruled. Logan lived a few houses away from the boy.

The boy was initially charged with murder, but Sweeney found that he did not shoot his friend on purpose and found him guilty of the lesser offense.

In the weeks before the boy learned his sentence, Mahoning County Assistant Prosecutor Anissa Modarelli said she had a “working theory” at the time of his trial that the boy shot Logan by accident, but the boy never admitted to having shot his friend, so prosecutors had no choice but to seek a conviction on murder. He would have been charged with reckless homicide and not murder if he would have admitted to an accidental shooting, she said.

“Detectives gave him opportunities to admit it, but he stuck with his denial,” she said. “When you have a defendant denying all responsibility, it leads you to believe it was purposeful,” she said.

Dellick’s ruling conceded that the boys were “best friends” and the shooting was accidental, but stated that the boy’s testimony did not line up with the facts, and his demeanor throughout the trial in July appeared to be dishonest.

The boy’s trial concluded July 21, leaving Dellick to review more than 100 pieces of evidence and several witness testimonies.

Dellick’s ruling stated that the forensics undermined the boy’s account of how Logan was shot. Logan was shot in the top of his head, and the shell casing was discharged toward Logan’s right side and not his left, which was inconsistent with the boy’s claim that Logan was holding the gun in his right hand, above his head, and shot himself at a downward angle.

The boy also said he was sitting in a chair next to Logan when the gun discharged and that he never moved anything at the scene. However, the chair was found folded and leaned up against a wall when police arrived.

The evidence also showed that only the boy’s DNA was found on the gun, and none of Logan’s.

Dellick’s ruling states that the scene suggests Logan was sitting down, playing a video game and facing the TV, and the boy was standing above and behind him, playing with the gun when he unintentionally pulled the trigger, shooting Logan.

The boy testified at his trial that he and Logan were best friends, and he would protect Logan from bullies.