Times Chronicle & Public Spirit
Man draws prison for fatal shooting in Cheltenham
A Chester County man is headed to prison after he admitted to fatally shooting a King of Prussia man in Cheltenham during what prosecutors alleged was an altercation about a drug debt.
Kether Optimus Massiaz, 24, of Malvern, was sentenced in Montgomery County Court on Monday to 8 to 16 years in a state correctional facility after he pleaded guilty to a charge of third-degree murder in connection with the March 15, 2020, shooting death of Wendell AllisonHaulcey, 28, of King of Prussia. Third-degree murder is a killing with malice.
The deadly altercation occurred along the 400 block of West Glenside Avenue in Cheltenham.
Massiaz’s guilty plea came shortly before jury selection was to begin for his trial. Massiaz pleaded guilty under a limited agreement with prosecutors who agreed to cap the minimum sentence at no less than 8 years and no more than 10 years and left the total sentence up to Judge Wendy Demchick-Alloy.
Demchick-Alloy imposed the 8-to-16-year sentence after hearing impassioned testimony from Massiaz’s relatives and friends, about 30 of whom packed the courtroom. Those witnesses described Massiaz, a 2016 graduate of Norristown High School who played high school basketball and had no prior criminal record, as “honest, thoughtful, loving and a great man.”
Addressing Massiaz, Demchick-Alloy told him he forgot about all the people who loved and supported him when he made the “catastrophically poor decision” to get involved in the violent world of dealing marijuana.
“All of those wonderful human qualities were not there at that moment,” DemchickAlloy said. “A life was taken here, illegally, unlawfully and unjustified. But at the end of the day your life could have been taken as well. You put yourself in harm’s way. You assumed a serious and deadly risk.”
Demchick-Alloy recommended that Massiaz be incarcerated at the State Correctional Institution at Pine Grove, which houses youthful offenders and offers numerous rehabilitative and educational
programs.
Several supporters of the victim also were in the courtroom but they declined to speak in court.
Assistant District Attorney Scott Frame and coprosecutor Gwendolyn Kull prosecuted the case. Defense lawyer David Walker represented Massiaz.
By pleading guilty to third-degree murder Massiaz avoided a possible conviction at trial of first-degree murder, which would have carried a mandatory life prison term.
The investigation began about 9:12 p.m. March 15 when Cheltenham police responded to the West Glenside Avenue location for a report of a shooting. Arriving officers found AllisonHaulcey, who had sustained a gunshot wound, at that location and he was transported to Abington Hospital Jefferson Health where he was pronounced dead.
A subsequent autopsy determined Allison-Haulcey died from a gunshot wound to the shoulder and chest. During the autopsy, a projectile was recovered from Allison-Haulcey’s body, according to detectives.
During a previous preliminary hearing, a county detective testified a 9mm Taurus semiautomatic pistol that was legally registered to Massiaz was found outside the residence where the shooting occurred. Prosecutors alleged Massiaz dropped the weapon while he fled from the scene.
Detectives said a ballistics expert opined “that the projectile removed from the victim was fired from the Taurus registered to the defendant in this case.”
Testimony and court papers revealed that at 9:14 p.m., Abington police were dispatched to a nearby 7-Eleven store, at 362 Easton Rd., for a report of a man bleeding from the head. The man was identified as Massiaz, who was operating a black BMW sedan.
Detectives alleged Massiaz was “uncooperative” while being questioned and when asked if he had a firearm he replied, “No.”
However, testimony revealed police observed Massiaz to be wearing an empty gun holster. The Taurus weapon that detectives found at the scene of the shooting “was the only pistol that fit that particular holster removed from the defendant,” a detective testified at a previous hearing.
Detectives said an analysis of cell phone tower data showed that a phone linked to Massiaz was in the area of the shooting at the time it occurred.
During the investigation, county and Cheltenham detectives located several eyewitnesses and obtained doorbell camera surveillance footage from a nearby residence that showed images of Massiaz and the victim, according to testimony and court papers.
The investigation determined Allison-Haulcey and Massiaz were involved in an altercation, with each carrying firearms and when shots were fired neighbors called police.
The area surrounding the homicide scene was processed and two guns were found, the Taurus linked to Massiaz and a High Point .45-caliber semi-automatic pistol recovered adjacent to Allison-Haulcey’s body, testimony revealed.
Prosecutors alleged text message communications between Massiaz and Allison-Haulcey in the hours leading up to the fatal shooting suggested the victim owed Massiaz $1,200 and a quarter-pound of marijuana and that the pair went to a West Glenside Avenue residence the victim used as “a stash house” presumably to get the money that was owed.
When neither the cash nor marijuana was provided, a struggle ensued and Massiaz shot the victim, prosecutors alleged.
Prosecutors maintained the evidence showed that Allison-Haulcey, after being shot, briefly chased Massiaz from the West Glenside Avenue residence and managed to fire off a shot from his gun toward Massiaz who left the scene in his BMW vehicle.