DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. — One of two suspects in the 2019 murder of an 18-year-old man in Daytona Beach was convicted by a Volusia County jury this week.
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The investigation started just before 10 p.m. on November 23, 2019 when Daytona Beach police officers responded to Campbell Middle School at Russell Drive and Cedar Street after a car crashed into the east side of the building.
Responding officers made contact with the driver, identified as 18-year-old Eric Gordon, and noticed he was bleeding profusely from the head.
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Gordon was taken to Halifax Hospital where it was determined he had been shot in the left side of his head. He was pronounced dead there early the next morning.
Security cameras in the area captured video of a possible suspect vehicle leaving the murder scene.
According to court documents, the same car was reported as being involved in another shooting the day after Gordon’s murder. Investigators eventually tracked down the owner of the car who pointed them towards their 16-year-old runaway daughter, Selvina Bernard, who had taken the car when she left.
Detectives interviewed Bernard who eventually admitted to stealing masks and gloves to be worn by her friends during a planned robbery and carjacking of Eric Gordon.
Bernard admitted to luring Gordon to a particular location and getting into his car to distract him so that her friends could rob him. She admitted to being in the car with Gordon when he was shot and leaving the scene with her friends in her mother’s car after the shooting.
After speaking to Bernard, investigators identified then 17-year-old Shyheem Rainge Jr. as the shooter.
Police announced the arrests of both teens in December of 2019. Rainge was picked up in Georgia and Bernard was arrested at the juvenile detention center in Daytona Beach where she was already being held on unrelated charges.
After a three-day trial held this week, Rainge was found guilty of second-degree murder and being a delinquent in possession of a firearm. Now 21, Rainge faces a possible sentence of life in prison.
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“An 18-year-old is dead and the shooter, now 21, will likely spend the rest of his life in prison,” State Attorney R.J. Larizza said in a statement about the case. “This is the reality and consequence of Young Guns violence.”
Selvina Bernard pleaded guilty to first-degree murder last year and is scheduled to be sentenced in October.
After a three-day trial this week, a Volusia County jury found Young Guns defendant Shyheem Rainge guilty of Second-Degree Murder and Delinquent in Possession of Firearm. pic.twitter.com/auPqVPlX8R
— State Attorney, Florida's Seventh Judicial Circuit (@SAO7FL) September 8, 2023
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