Copyright Buffalo Buffalo News
Two teenagers, ages 17 and 16, are about to go on trial for the June 2024 shooting that killed 3-year-old Ramone "Red" Carter. The ruling will prevent jurors from seeing and hearing key moments when the teenage suspects in the June 2024 double shooting that killed 3-year-old Ramone 'Red' Carter were in Buffalo police interview rooms. New court filings revealed more detail about a series of seemingly incriminating statements and actions by a teen suspect and his mother in the case of last year's fatal shooting of 3-year-old Ramone "Red" Carter. The judge in the Ramone "Red" Carter case says Buffalo police did not illegally eavesdrop on a teenage suspect and his mother last year during an investigation into the shooting that killed the 3-year-old boy. Last June, 3-year-old Ramone “Red” Carter was shot and killed near his home, an inadvertent victim of a shooting targeting someone else. His death left behind an ocean of grief for his mother, his siblings, his aunties, his friends and his neighborhood. Now, a year later, his mother remains in the house as reminders of what she lost engulf her. Defense attorneys for one of the two teens accused of killing 3-year-old Ramone "Red" Carter last year are still pushing to block the use of a video at an evidentiary hearing. Defense lawyers contend Buffalo police illegally eavesdropped on the teen and his mother by recording video and audio while they were in an interview room in police headquarters in the hours after the double shooting that killed Ramone "Red" Carter and injured his 7-year-old sister. The Erie County District Attorney's Office said defense attorneys for two teenagers have failed to show their clients can't get a fair trial. Attorneys for both teens have argued in court papers that the teens were improperly stopped and searched by police in the immediate aftermath of the June 21, 2024, shooting that killed Ramone "Red" Carter and injured his 7-year-old sister. “We see a lot of traumatic things here, stuff that we're not supposed to see as humans,” Buffalo Police Department Mental Health Coordinator Matt Cross said. “And, you know, the early intervention and the follow-ups after are extremely important.” Defense attorneys for two teenagers charged with killing a 3-year-old boy in a double shooting last month must withhold from their clients identifying information about potential witnesses because of "compelling" evidence that the witnesses need to be protected, a judge ruled Wednesday. “He ran right to me, and he was full of blood. I collapsed in my neighbor’s grass and said call 911,” Shakenya Griffin said of her 3-year-old son, Ramone L. Carter.
