photo by: Journal-World File

The Douglas County Judicial and Law Enforcement Center, 111 E. 11th St., is pictured on Wednesday, April 8, 2020.

A Douglas County judge has ruled that a 16-year-old will be tried as an adult for the part he allegedly played in a shooting in North Lawrence.

The 16-year-old, Eduardo Martinez-Diaz, of Lawrence, has been charged with two counts of attempted first-degree murder and one count of aggravated battery in connection with the shooting of Caylee M. Nehrbass, who was in a car with Javier I. Romero, 19, on May 27, 2021. He was charged in June of 2021, alongside his older brother, Alejandro Martinez-Diaz, 19, and Ontareo X. Jackson, 19, according to court records.

Nehrbass, who was then a teenager, testified in October 2021 that she was shot in the head and neck as she was riding in a car with Romero, her boyfriend.

Eduardo was 15 at the time of the shooting, but Judge Kay Huff determined he should be tried as an adult after multiple hearings at which witnesses who were in the car the night of shooting testified that Eduardo was the driver and had a gun.

Huff said her decision was partly based on Eduardo’s demeanor during the hearings; she said he acted “bored, blasé and barely engaged” and that he did not behave as though he was afraid of the consequences he faces.

“This lack of fear of consequences strikes me as adult behavior,” Huff said.

Other factors that Huff said played into her decision were the violent nature of the crime, a pending charge of witness intimidation that Eduardo received since the shooting, plus witness testimony that Eduardo had a gun and was driving the car that chased the car Romero and Nehrbass were in before the shooting.

In April two juvenile witnesses testified that they were in the car the night of the shooting.

The first witness said that she was a passenger in the car when Eduardo first saw Romero driving in North Lawrence. She said that after they saw Romero they stopped at the nearby Diaz house, where Eduardo entered and came back to the car with a gun.

She said she got out of the car at that time and went into the house, and later she heard gunshots. Then she left the Diaz home on foot, she said, and a friend picked her up.

Another witness said that he was also a passenger and that he wanted to get out of the car when they stopped at the Diaz house but Eduardo’s mother was home and he feared she would call his own mother because he was not supposed to be at the Diaz house. He said when they got to the Diaz house, Eduardo and Jackson went in and came back out with Alejandro, Eduardo’s brother, and that all three had something under their shirts.

The witness said Eduardo was the driver, Alejandro sat in the front passenger seat and Jackson sat behind Eduardo. He said they had barely left the Diaz house when they saw Romero’s car again, and while at a stop sign Alejandro opened the passenger door and stood up behind it. The witness said at that point he put his head down and heard a lot of gunfire.

The witness said that both cars then fled the scene and Eduardo drove the car through grassy alleyways to a nearby house, where Eduardo parked the car and went inside. The witness said he called his brother for a ride and didn’t know what the others did after that.

As previously reported by the Journal-World, Jackson pleaded no contest to the charge of attempted second-degree murder, a level-three felony, for his part in the shooting, and Huff sentenced him to 59 months on April 5.

Alejandro had begun his jury trial in April when a key witness, Romero, refused to testify, which delayed the trial pending an interlocutory appeal. An appeals court will determine whether the court can compel Romero to testify in the case.

Alejandro is being held on drug charges unrelated to the shooting. He was out on a $75,000 bond for the attempted-murder charge before the drug arrest in March. He is currently being held on a $250,000 bond.

Romero is in custody for an unrelated shooting where he is charged with first-degree murder in the killing of 21-year-old Christian Willis in September 2021 during an alleged drug deal. He was also charged in that case with possession of marijuana with intent to distribute. Romero is being held on a $1 million cash or surety bond.