Tewksbury Teen's Death Ruled A Homicide Days Before Trial Opens

TEWKSBURY, MA -- The Office of the State Medical Examiner submitted a long-anticipated report on the death of Ethan Costello to Middlesex District Attorney Marian Ryan last week and ruled the death Ethan Costello, 15, of Tewksbury at an underage drinking party last Oct. 28 was a homicide. The release of the report comes just days before Joseph Zagarella, 19, of Tewksbury, is scheduled to go on trial on charges of slamming Costello's head against a concrete floor.

Zagarella's trial is scheduled to begin on Wednesday. Last month a Lowell District Court judge denied the district attorney's office's motion to delay the trial because of the delays in obtaining the autopsy report from the state medical examiner. Without the report, prosecutors had reduced charges against Zagarella to assault.

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It is not clear whether or not Ryan's office will ask for murder or manslaughter charges in the case according to Fox 25, which initially reported on the release of the medical examiners completion of the report. "Our office has received the autopsy report and is the process of reviewing it to make a determination as to whether the charges should be amended in this case," Ryan's Office wrote in an email to FOX25 News.

Federal standards call for medical examiners to deliver autopsy reports in a timely fashion, with the national standard being 90 days. The Massachusetts Office of the State Medical Examiner had attributed the delay in the Costello autopsy on a heavy caseload and not enough employees to process a growing backlog.

More than 75 teens, most of them from Tewksbury, attended the party at a private residence in the Belvedere neighborhood of Lowell last October. According to witnesses, Costello was intoxicated and bumped into the bigger Zagarella, who grabbed Costello by the neck and slammed him onto a concrete floor.

Prosecutors allege Zagarella bragged about the assault as he left the party and initially lied to police when questioned. There was as much as a two-hour delay in getting Costello medical treatment, and no one at the party called emergency services, according to an investigator's report.

One witness said Thomas Ogden, the owner of the property, refused to help even as Costello was vomiting blood. Ogden told police his child had some friends over but denied having any knowledge of alcohol consumption, according to the investigator's report.

The witness and some friends then tried to revive Costello in a shower before driving him to the emergency room at Lowell General Hospital. Costello, whose injuries were described as "grave" when hospital officials called police, died of his injuries after being transported to Tufts Floating Hospital in Boston.

For more on this story, see Fox 25 Boston.

Patch file photo.

Dave Copeland can be reached at dave.copeland@patch.com or by calling 617-433-7851. Follow him on Twitter (@CopeWrites) and Facebook (/copewrites).