Boy, 17, Tried To Kill Teen At Lower Bucks Hotel: Court Records

LOWER BUCKS COUNTY, PA —A Lower Bucks County teenager faces attempted murder charges and numerous offenses for trying to kill another teenager in the parking lot of a Bensalem hotel, authorities said.

Court records state that the 17-year-old Bristol boy fired at least five bullets at an unidentified teenager outside the Best Western on the 3400 block of Street Road in Bensalem Township at 1 a.m. on May 14.

The teenager was arraigned before District Judge Joseph Falcone on attempted homicide and seven other felony counts including aggravated assault, discharging a firearm in an occupied structure, illegal possession of a firearm, and related misdemeanors. He is being held in the Bucks County Correctional Center on $500,000 bail.

Bensalem police have filed arrest warrants for Roger Valverde, 18, of Philadelphia, and Mario Ali, 18, of Levittown, who were allegedly with the teenager during the shooting.

Both face felony charges for aggravated assault, conspiracy and discharging a firearm into an occupied structure, and misdemeanor charges. Valverde is also charged with a felony count of criminal use of a communication device.

According to the affidavit obtained by Patch, a hotel employee told police a female guest on the second floor reported hearing gunshots and a car chasing someone in the parking lot. The woman said she heard three or four gunshots around 12:30 a.m., the affidavit states.

Four spent shell casings were found in the hotel parking lot, and another in a wall outside the hotel. At least one bullet entered an occupied hotel room on the first floor, barely missing a 4-year-old sleeping child, the affidavit said.

Police spoke to other hotel guests who reported hearing gunfire, and saw people shooting at someone from a car. One witness saw a green flashing dot — possibly a laser — waving around a vehicle before the shooting started, the affidavit said.

Video reviewed from nearby street cameras showed a white SUV exit the Pennsylvania Turnpike shortly before 12:30 a.m. and park in the hotel parking lot, before driving to the rear of the property, then getting back on the Pennsylvania Turnpike toward the New Jersey ramp around 12:30 a.m., police said.

Hotel video footage showed a male in the backseat of white KIA Sportage shooting at a male who was running away. The SUV’s headlines were off as it sped around the parking lot chasing the victim, the affidavit said.

Police interviewed the victim, who told police he knew “Quill” from school, and that he suspected that the teenager believed that he was talking bad about him, the affidavit said.

The victim alleged that the teenager and another teen lured him to the parking lot, but when he saw Quigley had a gun and a mask he ran just before the shooting started. The victim told police he made it to the second-floor hotel room of the woman who reported the shooting to police.

Bensalem police confirmed that the KIA Sportage was reported stolen out of Bristol Township two days earlier, and it was found abandoned in Bristol about seven hours after the shooting, the affidavit said.

Police found blood stains in the car, which was swabbed for DNA. The blood was tested and later matched a sample taken from the teenager, the affidavit said.