Teens killed counselor to escape facility, police say
Two Mon Valley teenagers accused of strangling a counselor at a Mercer County juvenile detention center early Monday, then escaping in his truck were captured by a Pittsburgh schools police officer on the South Side.
Anthony Machicote, 17, of North Versailles, and Jeremy Melvin, 16, of McKeesport, were charged with criminal homicide in the killing of Wayne Lamont Urey Jr., 43, of Mercer.
A 13-hour manhunt began after officials at George Junior Republic -- a private reform school and treatment center -- found Urey critically injured in a cottage on its Grove City campus about 12:30 a.m.
Police determined that Machicote and Melvin were the only boys missing from the center and that they had stolen Urey's blue 1998 Chevrolet pickup.
Investigators alerted other police agencies to be on the lookout.
A school police officer at South Vo-Tech High School remembered the alert when she saw the teens sitting in the pickup in the South Side school's parking lot about 1:30 p.m., schools police Chief Robert Fadzen said.
"She brought them into the office, they told her who they were and we called state police and city homicide," said Fadzen, who declined to identify the arresting officer.
The teens were arraigned last night and were being held in the Mercer County Jail without bond, pending a hearing Nov. 19.
According to court documents, Machicote and Melvin tied Urey's hands with bed sheets and his legs with a belt, and fastened a sheet around his head and neck.
Other boys who were staying in the cottage told police that Machicote and Melvin had planned to escape and tried to recruit others to join them, the court documents said.
One of the boys told investigators that on Sunday night he heard Melvin say "tonight's the night" and saw him shadow boxing.
Another juvenile told police he saw Machicote and Melvin run from the cottage shortly after midnight. Moments later, he found Urey bound and unconscious in a bedroom, authorities said.
He had suffered head trauma and a broken right leg. Paramedics could not revive him at the scene.
Urey died at 2 a.m. at United Community Hospital in Pine, according to Mercer County Coroner J. Bradley McGonigle. An autopsy was conducted by Dr. Eric Vey, a forensic pathologist from the Erie County Coroner's office.
In addition to homicide, the teens also were charged with robbery, theft, aggravated assault, escape and criminal conspiracy.
The two handcuffed suspects did not answer reporters' questions in late afternoon as state police from Mercer led them away from the city police investigations unit in East Liberty.
George Junior's executive director, Rick Losasso, said Urey had worked there for 12 years. He was on duty as an evening child-care worker, responsible for supervising a dozen boys as they slept in one of the center's 60 cottages on the school grounds.
Allegheny County pays George Junior Republic $121 daily a head to house, feed, educate and provide treatment to boys ages 8 to 18. Because George Junior Republic is a private facility, it screens juveniles and rejects those it believes it cannot help, Losasso said.
George Junior was founded in 1909 by philanthropist William Ruben George as a home for wayward boys, according to the facility's Web site. About 480 students attend the 450-acre campus, which has equestrian facilities, a gymnasium, vocational training facilities and an indoor swimming pool. There are no fences or locks at the center, but the boys are required to stay there.
As of September, the county had 59 boys in the center's drug and alcohol, residential and special-needs programs.
Melvin was sent to the center on Aug. 5 for assaulting a Port Authority police officer Downtown on June 5, Allegheny County Juvenile Court administrator James Rieland said. The officer was chasing Melvin after a shoplifting report and the youth "tussled" with the unnamed officer after a foot chase, Port Authority spokesman Bob Grove said.
Machicote, formerly of Homewood, has spent time in several juvenile facilities and programs since he set a fire in July 2001. He was sent to George Junior Republic on Oct. 1 for unauthorized use of a vehicle, Rieland said.
Confrontations between youths and counselors are rare, Losasso said. A female worker was assaulted, but not seriously injured, about four years ago, but there have been no previous attacks on staff of this magnitude, he said.
