A 19-year-old man who reportedly dared a friend to stab someone the night he and five others went looking for someone to assault has accepted a plea deal in relation to the death of 25-year-old Matthew Chew in 2010.
Rashad Perry entered an Alford plea to first-degree manslaughter today in the New London Superior Court. Perry had initially been charged with accessory to murder. The Alford plea does not admit guilt but recognizes that prosecutors could win a conviction on that charge.
Under the state offer, Perry will serve 20 years in prison, suspended after 15 years, with five years of probation. His sentencing has been scheduled for Feb. 19.
Perry is the third person to enter a plea in the case. Idris Elahi, the 19-year-old man who was charged with carrying out the stabbing, was sentenced to 35 years in prison on May 23 after earlier entering an Alford plea to a murder charge. Matias Perry, who is 19 and unrelated to Perry, will serve the same sentence as Perry under a state offer after pleading no contest to manslaughter on Nov. 29. Matias’ sentencing will take place on Feb. 7.
Also charged in the case are 19-year-olds Tyree Bundy and Marquis Singleton and 20-year-old Brian Rabell. Singleton is charged with murder while Bundy and Rabell are charged with accessory to murder.
Chew was stabbed six times on the evening of Oct. 29, 2010, while he was walking on Huntington Street from his job as a chef at 2 Wives Pizza to his Washington Street apartment. He was taken to Yale-New Haven Hospital, where he died of his injuries early the next day.
According to court testimony, the six men met at Elahi’s house on the evening of Oct. 29 and decided to assault a random person after they became bored. Rabell and Singleton said Perry dared Elahi to stab someone and that the two started to make an oath committing to the act before Rabell and Bundy stopped them.
Perry is the younger brother of Rahmel Perry, a 21-year-old man who was shot and killed at a Prest Street apartment on March 3, 2010. Police have charged 29-year-old Miguel Vega with murder as well as criminal attempt to commit murder, first-degree assault, home invasion, and criminal possession of a firearm in Rahmel’s death and the non-fatal shooting of then 20-year-old Michael Ellis in the same incident. That case remains before the court.
