Dracut man charged in shooting
Victim reportedly paralyzed
An 18-year-old Dracut man wanted in connection with a Sept. 26 shooting that may have left another man paralyzed from the waist down was taken into custody Tuesday morning and ordered held without bail pending a dangerousness hearing in Lowell District Court.
Christian Lemay was the lam since Oct. 6, when Lowell Police announced the teen was wanted for armed assault with intent to murder and described him as “armed and dangerous.”
Details of his arrest were not provided in a Tweet from Lowell Police announcing the arrest Tuesday.
Meghan Kelly, a spokeswoman for District Attorney Marian Ryan, said Lemay was arraigned later Tuesday and ordered held without bail pending a dangerousness hearing scheduled for Friday in Lowell District Court. Kelly said Lemay is also charged with assault with a dangerous weapon, carrying a loaded firearm without a license, carrying a firearm without a license, and discharging a firearm within 500 feet of a dwelling.
Police were called to the area of 35 Sutherland St., on Sept. 26, about 3:55 a.m., for a report of a shooting, and found a man down in the street suffering from a gunshot wound, according to a police report. The victim had an entry wound from a bullet in his torso, but no exit wound, according to police. He was initially taken to Lowell General Hospital, and then transferred to a Boston-area trauma center, according to a police report.
A police report filed in court along with a criminal complaint application against Lemay says witnesses told police the victim was acting as a go-between for Lemay and another man who planned to fight, but that Lemay started shooting without saying a word when he met the two. A police report says the victim was struck while the man Lemay allegedly wanted to fight was not hurt.
Police sought Lemay’s arrest after getting footage from a nearby home surveillance camera, and after a witness identified him as the man who fired the gunshots, according to a police report.
A Gofundme page setup by a friend of the victim’s family doesn’t provide the victim’s full name, but says doctors have told the family that the victim may be paralyzed from the waist down, though as of the time the page was set up the victim was not conscious yet, so his outlook was not clear. The family is raising money to help pay for expenses the victim will face.
“We would like all his focus to be on
Christian Lemay
him getting better and nothing else,” an aunt wrote on the Gofundme page.
As of Tuesday, no updates have been posted on the page since it was initially setup.