Crown offers plea deal

Teen charged after high school threats enters guilty plea to one charge

The lawyer for a teen charged in connection with a report of threats at a St. John’s high school says she has received an offer of a plea deal from the Crown, but has yet to review it with her client.

Representing 19-year-old Julio Ribeiro, Shelley Senior entered a guilty plea to a charge of breaching a court order, laid when Ribeiro was arrested April 19.

He has also been charged with criminally harassing a female via the social media networking site Instagram.

The court order was imposed a month earlier. Ribeiro will be back in court June 30, for a halfday hearing on the court order breach charge. Holy Heart of Mary High School — and subsequently other schools — went into safe mode the morning of April 19 after police received a call from staff reporting threats.

RNC officers identified Ribeiro as a suspect, and say they located him on Logy Bay Road after he ran from his home. Ribeiro was denied bail the day after his arrest, and has made his court appearances via videolink from Her Majesty’s Penitentiary since then.

Senior has told the court her client is significantly developmentally disabled and she is concerned for his well-being in prison.

His case was postponed last week after Senior reportedly went to HMP to speak with him, but was unable to do so because there were no private meeting rooms available and she was not permitted to speak to him in the hallway.