LOCKPORT — A Niagara County grand jury has indicted a Lockport teenager in connection with the November shooting death of Michael Hathaway.
Niagara County prosecutors confirmed that a 17-year-old suspect, originally arrested and charged in late November, was arraigned Tuesday during a proceeding in Niagara County Court-Youth Part in Niagara Falls. Falls City Court Judge Diane Vitello, sitting as a Youth Part judge, conducted the arraignment.
The grand jury indictment charged the teen with counts of second-degree murder and second-degree criminal possession of a weapon. He pleaded not guilty to the charges and was ordered held pending further proceedings.
The teen’s name is not being released under New York’s Raise the Age Law.
Lockport police arrested the juvenile Nov. 28 as part of their investigation into the Nov. 21 slaying of Hathaway on Spalding Street. He is accused of shooting Hathaway, 26, inside his home.
Police Chief Steve Abbott said the shooting was “targeted” and “not random.”
Abbott confirmed that Hathaway was a level-three registered sex offender, but said that status did not appear to play a role in his death.
Hathaway’s death was the third firearms related homicide in the past four years in the Lock City. Prior to the October 2020 shooting death of Cheyenne Farewell during a house party on Niagara Street, LPD had not investigated a fatal shooting case in about a decade.