MANCHESTER, NH — A teenager accused of murdering a Manchester Memorial High School senior nearly two years ago is asking the court to set a bail hearing for him.
Jaiden Ciruzzi, 18, currently being detained in the Valley Street jail, was to be arraigned Monday in Hillsborough County Superior Court North on first- and second-degree murder charges accusing him in the shooting death of Ian Jewell. The grand jury handed up the indictments on Sept. 20 against Ciruzzi.
On Oct. 1, public defenders Kimberly A. Kossick and Shelagh O’Donnell electronically filed the arraignment paperwork and asked that the scheduled arraignment be canceled. They also asked that a bail hearing be scheduled for after Oct. 15.
New Hampshire Assistant Attorney General Erin E. Fitzgerald, in turn, filed a motion asking the court to set the bail hearing after Nov. 1. She said Senior Assistant Attorney General Peter Hinckley is currently prosecuting a multi-week homicide case in Strafford County.
In that case, Timothy Verrill, 37, of Dover is on trial on charges of first-degree murder in the Jan. 27, 2017 stabbing deaths of Christine Sullivan, 48, and Jenna Pellegrini, 32.
According to Ciruzzi’s first- and second-degree murder indictments, on Nov. 19, 2017, Ciruzzi shot Jewell during a robbery in Goffstown. The first-degree murder charge alleges Ciruzzi knowingly shot Jewell while the second-degree murder charge alleges he recklessly shot Jewell.
The shooting took place about 4:20 p.m. in the parking lot of Ace Hardware, 5 Depot St. When police arrived on the scene, they found a wounded Jewell. He was taken to a local hospital where he later died.
An autopsy performed by New Hampshire Chief Medical Examiner Dr. Jennie V. Duval determined Jewell died from a gunshot wound to the chest.
Days after the shooting, Goffstown police arrested a teen who was charged with first- and second-degree murder. The juvenile’s name was never released by investigators.
In order for Ciruzzi to be tried as an adult, prosecutors had to seek to have him certified as an adult, a long process that takes place in Juvenile Court. Fitzgerald said she could not comment on that aspect of the case.
