17-year-old charged with murder in shooting of 15-year-old in Grand Rapids

Yahoo

13-05-2025

GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. (WOOD) — A 17-year-old now faces a murder charge in the death of a 15-year-old who was gunned down in Grand Rapids last year.
Cartiyae Pascal was arraigned Tuesday on a count of open murder and a weapons charge in the death of Amillier Penn, Grand Rapids Police Department Chief Eric Winstrom confirmed. Winstrom said he is being charged as an adult.
'For nearly a year, GRPD detectives have been following every lead and every tip, painstakingly building this case to bring justice for Milli and his family,' Winstrom said in a statement. 'The brazen murder of a 15-year-old child, out playing football with his friends, is one that I hope our city will never forget. I know that there are many people in Grand Rapids and across the country who have been invested in justice for Milli. While it can never erase the sense of loss, I hope that gives some measure of healing to his family and loved ones.'
Pascal's name had already when a docuseries about GRPD premiered in April. The first episode spotlighted the investigation into Amillier's death.
'There is just a ton of work to be done (in this murder investigation). And as was showcased in this episode, I think the biggest obstacle for this was the trust,' GRPD Chief Eric Winstrom told News 8 after the show aired.
He said he hoped the docuseries would encourage people to come forward with information.
Winstrom was skeptical that releasing the suspect's name before charges were filed would affect the criminal case. Pascal's attorney, who is representing him in a separate shooting, disagreed.
'If the Grand Rapids Police Department were also involved in the production or the disclosure of the information and discovery, I think that can be and probably is very prejudicial to my client,' attorney Barton Morris said.
Amillier, who went by Milli, was shot and killed in broad daylight on June 2 while playing football with friends on Umatilla Street SE near Madison Avenue.
'In this case, this young man was playing football with friends. He wasn't engaged in some kind of illegal activity. He wasn't armed with a handgun. He's 15 years old. So I don't think when we discover a motive that it's gonna be a motive that makes any sense,' Grand Rapids Police Department Chief Eric Winstrom said in the days after the killing.
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For months, Milli's family begged for information about the shooter.
'Fifteen years old and had his whole life ahead of him, taken from him, robbed from him for nothing,' Corey Penn, Amillier's dad, told News 8 in July. 'It still feel like the same day. It feels like when I got that phone call when my son was shot. That is what it feels like and it feels like that every single day.'
A $10,000 reward for information leading to an arrest was offered through Silent Observer.
'We are fighting against what seems to be a culture amongst the witnesses of a code of silence,' Winstrom said in July. 'You've got a child, a 15-year-old boy, who was playing football. Whatever the history, whatever the motive was, it doesn't make sense and it doesn't make sense for adults who were there and who have information not to come forward and do the right thing for Milli.'
'It's no honor amongst thieves. I can say that, and it runs parallel with this situation because my son was robbed of his life at 15 years old,' Penn said. 'So we as a community, as adults, we've got to start taking some accountability for the things that we allow. Somebody has got to stand up and set an example.'
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Penn said he would not watch the docuseries episode about his son's death.
'I didn't watch the documentary, because this is an everyday hell for me that I'm living in,' he told News 8 in April. 'I sat for six hours to get past that yellow tape to view my son's body. But I want to remember my son how I last seen him alive, as much as possible.'
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Corey Penn and Seeds of Promise GR have asked the city of Grand Rapids to designate Umatilla Street SE from Madison Avenue to Union Avenue as 'Amillier Penn Way.' On Tuesday, the city of Grand Rapids Community Development Committee scheduled a public hearing on the requested commemorative street name designation for June 10.
Milli was one of two 15-year-olds shot and killed in Grand Rapids within weeks of each other last year. La-kyijah Williams was shot dead May 18 in the city's Arena District. Josiah Pittman, 18, was .
Pascal was in an unrelated shooting on Sept. 1, 2024, that injured a man.
In that case, police say, a shooter '(lay) in wait' for the victim when he came out of a convenience store on Madison Avenue at Dickinson Avenue SE, then shot him multiple times. The victim's mother, who narrowly avoided gunfire, rushed him to the hospital and doctors were able to save his life.
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Police say they have video that shows Pascal was the shooter outside the convenience store, and that his mother also identified him as the person in the video when she accompanied her son to a police interrogation.
Detectives said Pascal and his mother kept talking in the interview room after they left the room, testifying that Pascal's mother asked, 'How many times did you shoot him?' and Pascal replied, 'Um, about five.'
'She asks if there's any more bodies on the gun, and he says, 'No,'' police testimony continued.
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