Arrest in shooting death of 2-year-old boy

NEW YORK

Police say the suspected gunman had been hiding in Raleigh, North Carolina all these years.

"This is my life every day. Life without my son, this is my life every day," said Joann Pacheco, the victim's mother.

For Joann Pacheco, the past seven years have been torture as she's endured the unsolved murder of her 2-year-old son David.

"Anger, pain, my pain never goes away, my pain never goes away, my pain is every day, 24 hours a day, 365 days a year," Pacheco said.

Prosecutors say they finally have the man who killed David, 35-year-old Darryl Hemphill, arraigned Friday, prosecutors, say, for firing the bullet at a member of a rival gang, but he missed and hit David instead.

David was sitting in a car seat, as his mom drove him to mass, on Easter Sunday.

"A bullet ripped through the car. The bullet entered young David's chest. It went through his lung, severed his spinal column, and killed him," said Adam Oustatcher, prosecutor.

David's mom has been there before. Just after the shooting in 2006, the Bronx DA prosecuted a man named Nicholas Morris for murder.

But later, they determined the gun they'd found on him was not the murder weapon.

That led to a mistrial and the family's nightmare continued for years more.

"We blame no one except those who were not able to come forward and testify and say who the shooter was from the beginning," said Gloria Cruz, a family friend.

But now, prosecutors say new witnesses have stepped forward, naming Hemphill as the real shooter.

They also matched his DNA with a sweater they found at the crime scene.

"They focused for a long time on another person whom they believed and tried and wanted to put away for the rest of that person's life, because they believed that person was the shooter. Now they've turned their attention to Darryl Hemphill," said Eric Sears, Hemphill's attorney, "I don't have any reason to think their judgment is any better now than it was then."

"I just want closure. Nothing's going to bring him back, nothing's ever going to bring him back," Pacheco said.

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