Jury finds Sarasota man, 20, guilty of murder, attempted murder in 2019 shooting

CORRECTION: This story has been updated to include the correct spelling of Arteayia Howard's name which was misspelled in an earlier version of this story.

Arteayia Howard spoke quietly from the stand, tears flowing down her cheeks as she answered questions about her son who died a month after he was shot in November 2019 during a trial this week for the 20-year-old man accused of shooting a former classmate and killing Howard's son.

Howard recalled the moment she learned from her sister that her son, Le’Quavious Claridy, had been shot while she was driving home from work in Palmetto.

She remembered running up to the scene on Carver Street on Nov. 10, 2019, after parking her car nearby and heading straight to her son who she spotted lying near a speed bump and his red bicycle.

“I don’t want to die,” Howard said her son told her.

Claridy was rushed to Sarasota Memorial Hospital where he remained for a month, his condition improving and deteriorating several times before he died on Dec. 10.

Following three hours of deliberation, a six-person jury found Darion Lee, 20, guilty Friday for murder in the second degree with a firearm and attempted murder in the first degree in connection to the 2019 shooting that killed Claridy and wounded then 17-year-old Sas Young.

He will be sentenced at a later date and the maximum punishment Lee faces is life in prison.

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"I'm really glad that after four years, we're able to bring this case to a close for Mr. Claridy and Mr. Young," Assistant State Attorney Kennedy Legler said Friday afternoon.

Assistant Public Defender Jamie Pasquali, who was a co-counsel on the case, said the defense would be filing an appeal on behalf of Lee. Pasquali added she will continue to defend Lee in two other cases against him, including a 2019 aggravated assault with a deadly weapon case and a 2022 battery of an officer case.

Previous Sarasota Herald-Tribune reporting states Lee, who was 16 at the time, was arrested after he turned himself in following the shooting. An affidavit in the case states the shooting was over an ongoing dispute over a dirt bike between Lee and Young, both students at Triad Sarasota alternative school.

When police arrived on the scene, two victims were on the ground near pools of blood, reports stated at the time.

Sarasota Police Department officers and firefighter-paramedics who testified said that when they arrived, they saw Young lying on the speed bump in the middle of the road while Claridy was lying on his back a little further away next to his overturned bicycle.

Claridy’s aunt testified she was driving home and on the phone with Howard when she received a call from her nephew. When she picked up, Claridy told her that he and Young had been shot. In the background of the 911 call, Young could be heard saying, "Titi come quick Darion got us," prosecutors highlighted throughout the trial.

Claridy was in a coma following the shooting, but when he awoke, he told his aunt it had been Lee who had shot him and repeated the name to detectives who came to interview him at the hospital.

At least four witnesses said when they asked Claridy who had shot him both at the scene and in the hospital, he had told them it had been “Darion Lee” and described Lee as being heavy set with short dreads.

Defense attorney Kathleen Kirwin, who represented Lee, asked one Sarasota Police Department lieutenant if Claridy could have said “Davion Lee,” but the lieutenant said with certainty that Claridy had said “Darion Lee.”

Code of silence complicates investigation

During the second day of the trial, prosecutors called SPD Sgt. Dominic Harris, who grew up in the Newtown community, to explain the code of silence.

Harris said people fear speaking or being seen with law enforcement after something happens because they’re scared of being labeled a snitch and of someone retaliating against them or their families. Harris added the code of silence can hinder investigations, especially when someone stops cooperating or outright refuses to speak with police.

Harris said when the police went to speak with Young at the hospital, he was hesitant and told the detectives he didn’t know who shot him, although he confirmed he’d been in an argument with Lee previously.

When detectives spoke with Young again at his home after he was discharged from the hospital, Harris and Detective Adam Morningstar said Young appeared to be upset that they’d come, throwing his crutches and refusing to speak.

Kirwin’s questions towards Harris seemingly pointed out that the investigation by Sarasota police focused only on Lee without looking into anyone else, despite Young supposedly trying to tell them it wasn’t Lee. However, Harris said law enforcement focused their investigation on Lee because Claridy never wavered from saying it had been Lee who shot at him and Young.

While Young was subpoenaed to testify during the week-long trial, he did not appear in court.

Kirwin questioned why blood samples taken from the scene and two bicycles weren’t tested for DNA or dusted for fingerprints. Kirwin also questioned detectives why they didn't get a search warrant for Lee's car the night of the shooting if they were so sure that Lee was the suspect, and his car was potentially involved, even despite eyewitnesses not being able to identify the car hours after the shooting.

Teacher testifies why she didn’t report outburst prior to shooting

Days before the shooting, both Lee and Young were suspended from Triad Sarasota alternative school following a verbal argument on Nov. 4, Principal Melanie Ritter said. Ritter added Lee was suspended for two days as he wouldn’t calm down when she was speaking with him.

After Lee returned to school, another outburst seemingly ensued in one of his classes, according to Vivian Heggs, one of Lee's teachers.

Heggs said Lee started to make a commotion in her class, raising his voice and allegedly saying he would shoot Young. When Heggs pointed out that Lee didn’t have a gun, he responded he did. Heggs said she continued to attempt to get Lee to calm down and return his attention to his work.

Previous reporting: Sarasota teacher knew of threats days before shooting that left teen wounded, man dead

When Kirwin asked why Heggs hadn’t reported Lee’s statements at the time, she explained she didn't think they held merit, and since Lee wasn’t saying he planned to come to school with a gun and shoot anyone, she didn’t take the threat seriously.

It wasn’t until after she’d heard about the shooting that she immediately informed Ritter about Lee’s threats, writing a statement about what she’d heard.

Following an internal investigation, Heggs was cleared and retired in 2020.

Ritter later visited Young in the hospital as he was recovering and after speaking with him, she alerted detectives that he had mentioned the name Tyderious Washington. Detectives re-interviewed Young, and in March 2023, interviewed Washington and found he had an alibi the night of the shooting.

Forensic data maps where Lee’s phone was night of shooting

Legler called on SPD forensic data specialist Brian Yang to break down information pulled from Lee’s phone which police had found during a search of his mother’s home in December 2019.

Yang said from the GPS location data pulled from the phone, he was able to plot out the device’s location using Google Maps, indicating that the phone had been in the area of Gregg Street during the time of the shooting, which is in close proximity to Carver Street.

The phone returned back to Lee’s mother’s home shortly after the shooting before heading north to Old Bradenton Road before midnight on Nov. 10. In the early morning hours of Nov. 11, the phone made its way to Bradenton Beach where it remained for some time, until returning to Sarasota by mid-day.

Kirwin pointed out that Lee's phone data didn't list a GPS location ping on either the speed bump on Carver Street where the shooting happened or heading north on Orange Avenue, which was the direction a Chevy Malibu seen by witnesses and on video following the shooting had gone. Police in their investigation found that Lee's mother owned a Chevy Malibu and that Lee often drove it.

When Kirwin called her digital expert James Klay, a retired Sarasota County Sheriff's Office detective, and owner of a forensic consulting firm, he said he plotted out over 18,000 location pings from the phone, establishing a pattern of places the phone had visited. In the data points, it appeared the phone frequented the area of Maple Avenue and 23rd Street many times prior to the shooting, which is just a few blocks from the shooting.

Klay also said the Sprint cell tower data placed the phone three blocks north of where the GPS location data placed Lee.

Legler pointed out in his questioning that according to the GPS location data, Lee's phone had only traveled to the area of Gregg Street near Carver Avenue once: the evening of the shooting on Nov. 10, 2019.

Gabriela Szymanowska covers the legal system for the Herald-Tribune in partnership with Report for America. You can support her work with a tax-deductible donation to Report for America. Contact Gabriela Szymanowska at gszymanowska@gannett.com, or on Twitter.

This article originally appeared on Sarasota Herald-Tribune: Sarasota man, 20, found guilty of second-degree murder, attempted murder