A Boston man was convicted Monday of fatally stabbing a 17-year-old boy outside a pizzeria during the city’s annual Caribbean Festival in 2021, the Suffolk district attorney’s office said.
Omara Shears, 46, was convicted in Suffolk Superior Court of first-degree murder in the death of Javare Sommerville-Adams, the district attorney’s office said in a statement. Shears’ trial lasted four days, and the jury began deliberating on Friday, prosecutors said.
Sommerville-Adams was from Providence, the Globe previously reported.
Shears stabbed Sommerville-Adams in the neck on Aug. 28, 2021, as he was watching the Caribbean Festival in front of Stash’s Pizza at the intersection of Columbia Road and Blue Hill Avenue, prosecutors said. They were only near each other briefly before the stabbing and had no known connection to each other.
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“After the stabbing, Sommerville-Adams put his hand to his neck, stumbled and fell to the sidewalk,” prosecutors said. Police rushed over to help Sommerville-Adams, who was taken to Boston Medical Center and pronounced dead.
Shears was seen on video looking around after the stabbing, prosecutors said. He put on a baseball cap, walked toward Seaver Street, and interacted with members of his family while still holding a knife in his hand, the district attorney’s office said.
Many members of Sommerville-Adams’s family were in the courtroom Monday as the verdict was read, as was Suffolk District Attorney Kevin Hayden, prosecutors said.
While the verdict won’t bring Sommerville-Adams back, it can bring his family the knowledge thatShears has been held accountable for his actions, Hayden said in the statement.
“I’m grateful for the jury’s service and verdict in this tragic and inexplicable act of violence — which ended the life of a young man enjoying a city festival — and my office will remain at the service of Javare’s family as they continue to process their terrible loss,” Hayden said.
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Adam Sennott can be reached at adam.sennott@globe.com.