Jupiter triple homicide: Man found competent to stand trial nearly 7 years after shootings

WEST PALM BEACH — A judge has ruled that a man accused in the shooting deaths of three people in Jupiter on Super Bowl Sunday in 2017 is competent to stand trial.

Circuit Judge Donald Hafele this month found Marcus Steward able to assist with his defense in denying a motion filed by Steward's attorney to have the case dismissed for ongoing incompetency.

Hafele transferred the case from the mental-health court to the trial court, setting the case for a Jan. 4 status hearing before Circuit Judge Scott Suskauer.

Steward, 31, was one of two men accused in the Feb. 5, 2017, shooting deaths of Sean Henry, 25, Brandi El-Salhy, 24, and Kelli Doherty, 20, in the backyard of a rented home on Mohawk Street in Jupiter River Estates, a neighborhood of single-family homes south of Indiantown Road and east of Delaware Boulevard.

The gunfire also wounded Charles Vorpagel, the home's renter, who Henry, El-Salhy and Doherty were visiting. The four of them were sitting around a backyard fire pit when the shooting began.

Police reports released months after the shootings indicated that disputes over drug sales, turf and debts led to the attack.

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In 2019, a jury found Steward's co-defendant, Christopher Vasata of Jupiter, guilty on three counts of first-degree murder and one count of attempted murder. It declined to sentence Vasata to death. Now 31, Vasata is serving a life prison sentence at the Charlotte Correctional Institution in Punta Gorda, according to state records.

Steward, whose last listed address is in Riviera Beach, has denied having any involvement in the murders. However, Jupiter detectives said DNA evidence recovered near a stolen vehicle that belonged to Henry connected Steward to the murders.

In December 2017, a grand jury indicted Steward on three counts of first-degree murder and one count of attempted first-degree murder. The Palm Beach County State Attorney’s Office filed a notice of intent to seek the death penalty but later withdrew it.

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Circuit Judge Charles Burton signed an order in November 2021 declaring Steward incompetent to stand trial because of an intellectual disability and assigned him to be committed to the state Agency for Persons with Disabilities for treatment.

In a motion filed in October, defense attorney Abigail Langweiller of the state Office of Criminal Conflict and Civil Regional Counsel said that Florida law requires a court to dismiss charges without prejudice within a timeframe not exceeding two years if a defendant remains incompetent to face trial.

She said state prosecutors would have the option to re-file charges in the event Steward was deemed competent.

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State-appointed psychologist finds defendant competent to face trial

In a written response, Assistant State Attorney Ettie Feistman argued that the court should issue a new ruling on the status of Steward's competency before deciding on whether to dismiss the charges.

Feistman disputed the defense's argument that Steward remained incompetent to face trial, telling the court that a report written in October by Dr. Nichole Livingstone, a licensed psychologist with the state agency caring for Steward, indicated that he was competent.

In a hearing Dec. 19 that lasted nearly two hours, Livingstone testified on behalf of the state while Dr. Cathy Colet, a licensed psychologist based in Jupiter, testified on behalf of the defense.

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Investigators credited Steward's arrest to a DNA technology known as STRmix, a software program used by the Palm Beach County Sheriff's Office Forensic Biology Unit. STRmix uses an algorithm to help scientists identify individual DNA contributors in evidence that contains the DNA of several people.

Jupiter police reported that Henry's Honda Accord was stolen from the murder scene and found abandoned the next morning on southbound Interstate 95 near Northlake Boulevard.

According to police accounts, Vasata was placed into Henry's Honda after being shot during the gunfire. He was dumped a few blocks away in the Paseos neighborhood, where he remained until PBSO deputies found him.

At Vasata's trial, state and defense attorneys presented different accounts of how his injury occurred. The defense told jurors another man who was present the night of the Mohawk Street attack but never charged shot Vasata. Prosecutors said Steward accidentally shot Vasata in the frenzy of the night.

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Police reports indicated that drugs were at the center of the shootings, with Vorpagel telling investigators that at least three people with masks and gloves entered the backyard that Sunday night and shouted, "Pay what you owe, (expletive)."

After recovering Henry's Honda, investigators found a 7.62 mm-caliber rifle, two black gloves and a set of BMW keys, among other items, in a nearby culvert swale, according to police documents. The also found a hooded sweatshirt inside the vehicle.

According to police accounts, 89% of the DNA contribution on one glove came from Steward, while 7% came from Vasata. The last 4% belong to an unidentified person.

The frame of the rifle had a 69% DNA contribution from Vasata, 25% Steward and 6%t from an unidentified person, investigators said. The sweatshirt had a 53% DNA contribution from Steward, 33% from Vasata and 14% from an unidentified person.

Julius Whigham II is a criminal justice and public safety reporter for The Palm Beach Post. You can reach him at jwhigham@pbpost.com and follow him on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter, at @JuliusWhigham. Help support our work: Subscribe today.

This article originally appeared on Palm Beach Post: Accused Jupiter triple homicide gunman found competent to stand trial