The two individuals arrested following the shooting death of an 18-year-old girl over the weekend in Cedar Grove made their first appearance in Orange County Court in front of Judge Joe Buckner on Wednesday afternoon.
Xzavier D’Andre Gibson was arrested in Alamance County Tuesday afternoon by the US Marshals Joint Fugitive Task Force. Takeem Turrentine turned himself into the Orange County Sheriff’s Office at 10:50 a.m. Wednesday.
Both are charged with first-degree murder in the shooting death of 18-year-old Rashiya Melton. The shooting occurred early Sunday morning at a party at a barn venue on Mill Creek Road. Melton was shot in the head and airlifted to UNC Hospitals, where she died Monday afternoon.
A second individual was treated and released from the hospital after being shot in the leg, but investigators said the victim was not cooperating early in the investigation.
After initially saying some witnesses were not cooperating with the investigation, Orange County Sheriff Charles Blackwood said that changed once the severity of the situation was known.
“Once the story was released that she was in grave condition and she had passed, we started getting calls from folks,” Blackwood said. “The level of cooperation went up.”
Blackwood said party attendees were from as far away as Prospect Hill and Winston-Salem, making the investigation difficult in some ways, but he said he was proud of the work done by the office’s deputies and investigators.
“Orange County is a welcoming community, and we really want everyone to come in,” Blackwood said. “And we want to be inclusive. But if you act up over here, and you break the law, and you victimize people, we’re going to catch you.”
Attention has focused over the course of the week on the barn venue where the party was held. There are questions as to whether the property owner was properly permitted to have events on the property. Blackwood said the property owner would be held accountable in either civil or criminal cases. The sheriff said the criminal aspect, if it were to come to fruition, would likely focus on the acts leading up to the shooting.
“When you’ve got underage people on your property, and they’re consuming alcohol, that’s a problem,” he said.
Blackwood continued to put out a call for anyone with information on the shooting to come forward.
“To the parents – all the parents out there – those with children and those who’ve lost children,” he said, “we’re working hard on this case for you.”
The investigation is ongoing. Blackwood said there are still persons of interest the sheriff’s office would like to talk to in order to verify stories, but he said there were no other suspects at this time.
He said he believed Melton was an innocent bystander. The sheriff’s office has a line of communication open and has been updating the family throughout the investigation, the sheriff said.
Gibson and Turrentine are facing first-degree murder charges. Gibson is also facing one count of possession of a firearm by a felon. He was convicted to conspiracy to commit robbery with a dangerous weapon in February, according to the district attorney’s office.
Both are due back in court on November 19.
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