Barberton Middle student, mom killed in shooting in Akron — ‘He didn’t just dream dreams, he dreamed big dreams’

PHOTO FROM GOFUNDME ACCOUNT

Jericho Mangual, 12, and his mom, Tania Mangual, of Barberton, were shot and killed March 28 in Akron.

PHOTO PROVIDED

Jericho Mangual, 12, was a sixth-grade student at Barberton Middle School.

PHOTO PROVIDED

Jericho Mangual’s close friends at Barberton Middle School, Aiden Sullivan, Braylon Lloyd, and Tevin Preston, made shirts in his honor.

BILLBOARD PHOTOS BY CHRISTINA McCUNE
A BMS class put notes with messages on Mangual’s locker and other students began doing the same. The tribute outgrew the locker and was moved to a bulletin board.

 

By CHRISTINA McCUNE

BGNN managing editor

BARBERTON  Jericho Mangual was a 12-year-old boy, but his soul was well beyond his years.

Some of his friends and teachers at Barberton Middle School paint a picture of a preteen who dressed in a suit and tie on occasion, checked in on students and staff by name, played basketball and trumpet, and drew cartoons and illustrations. He had launched his own YouTube channel, and recently created a TikTok account for an alternative rock cover band he was forming with friends.

In a school with 740 students, Mangual stood out.

His big personality and wide smile fit his tall frame and his laugh filled classrooms. His ideas and aspirations overflowed the school walls.

Mangual made sure friends and peers were faring well at the middle school. The sixth-grade student also asked adults daily how they were getting along.

He addressed administrators and made sure he knew teachers by name even if he didn’t have class with them.

“He talked to you and smiled a lot,” said Dr. Markiel Perkins, BMS principal. “A bright young man. Bright, intelligent, charismatic, very respectful. He looked you in your eye when he’d shake your hand. He checked in on adults, believe it or not. Not too many kids check on adults to see how they’re doing. We’re deeply heartbroken and saddened and hurt by what’s happened.”
Tim Stults had Mangual in his STEM class.

“We all are sorry for the loss as a district, as a community and as a staff for sure,” Stults said.

Near the end of March as the school was preparing for spring break, Stults recalled Mangual stopping by his desk and asking him if he could share his dreams and visions for his YouTube channel he had just started.

“He sat down and began to tell me how he loved to cook and wanted to do cooking illustrations on his YouTube channel. He loved to play trumpet and he wanted to put trumpet illustrations. He loved to sing and rap and he wanted to put those on there as well. He turned around and said: ‘I’ve got a lot of dreams for my YouTube channel.’ When I think of that story I think of how Jericho was a dreamer. He didn’t just dream dreams, but he dreamed big dreams and I think that story means a lot in the fact that Jericho would want other young people to dream big dreams as well. I appreciated the fact Jericho was willing to share his dreams with me. I think if Jericho could leave a message for all of us it’s that we could all dream big dreams.”

Stults said he is thankful to have had Mangual in class and even more thankful for moments such as those at his desk when the young man shared his “big dreams” with him.

“Young people should dream big dreams because that’s what Jericho did,” Stults said.

Students were released for spring break.

A couple of days later, Mangual and his mother, Tania, were killed in a shooting in Akron.

Over the break, staff members and the Barberton City Schools community were informed about what happened and members of the Barberton Community Wellness Collaborative and school staff were available for two of the days while school was not in session. When students returned from break, the member agencies from the collaborative and school staff were available again.
Perkins said the week that students returned from spring break was tough. The school had a moment of silence for Mangual after they returned from their days off. Students have been working through their grief and coming up with ways to pay tribute to their classmate. Perkins shared a photo of three close friends of Mangual’s who had made shirts in his honor.

One of the teachers led her class in putting Post-it and sticky notes with messages on Mangual’s locker. Soon, other students began doing the same. The tribute outgrew the locker and surrounding lockers and students moved the tribute to a bulletin board in the hallway. The school also planned to have students paint rocks with messages to place in the school courtyard as a lasting tribute.
Last week, Perkins had not heard yet about a local memorial for the mom and son.

The BGNN welcomed people’s comments about the Manguals in a Facebook post and also shared information on Facebook about a GoFundMe account created by Iris Cardona-Andino, who stated she was raising funds to bring her daughter and grandson home for a burial in New York. As of April 11, the account had raised more than $15,400 and people left many words of support.
“My daughter Jazmine was friends with him,” Ashley Henry wrote on the BGNN’s Facebook page. “She said he was always so nice to everyone and really really loved football. So sad, such a tragic loss. Thoughts and prayers for the family.”

Sara Poole wrote to The BGNN: “My Daughter Teagan always spoke so highly of her close friend Jericho. She said he was always nice, respectful, polite and kind to everyone. He was funny and an all around loving person. She’s going to miss always talking to him and playing basketball with him. She was telling me the other day she’s going to miss hearing him say “Thank you Mom” when his Mom Tania would bring him food and hearing him play around with his brothers when they were on the phone. He is a beautiful light in this world that will be sorely missed.”

Michael Fox, who teaches private trumpet lessons, only had a brief experience knowing and teaching Mangual, but he wrote that his heart ached over the senseless and tragic loss and he expressed concern about students and teachers during the difficult time.

“Jericho Mangual, the 12-year-old boy who, along with his mother, was murdered in their car in Akron Saturday evening was a Barberton Middle School student of mine,” Fox wrote in an email.

“Jericho, at my height and weight (5’10” 210+), was big for a 12 year-old, and though he had a soft-spoken, sweet and earnest demeanor he played his trumpet with a gigantic, brash, and loud tone. He was really into playing the trumpet and learning about music.

“I’ll remember him for his huge smile, his laughing out loud two weeks ago as I introduced him and his trio mates to “beatnik jazz lingo” (Are you hip? Don’t be a square…), for the love at first sight and sound he had for the instrument he’d just begun to explore, his studious attention and willingness to learn, and his joyful beaming when getting it right. RIP, Jericho. You were a large personality, and a sweet kid who left us all way too soon.”

This past Friday after school, some sixth-grade classmates and staff members stayed afterward to share some of their memories of their friend and student.

A group of friends would walk to TWO22, an afterschool program with Mangual every Tuesday at Lake Anna YMCA.

Luke Riffle said he enjoyed playing basketball with him and he was an outstanding player.

“He even shot a couple threes, which is not common in sixth grade,” Riffle said.

“He was kind-hearted,” he said. “His smile brought joy to me.”
Aria Carlson said she had a few classes with him and he was in middle school band with her. She plays trombone.

“Jericho was a determined trumpet player and made everyone laugh,” she said. “He was an outgoing kind and caring person and that’s what made him stand out to me. … He was really kind to people.”

Alex Ellis said Mangual loved going to the afterschool program at the Y and liked playing basketball there and “he was just a really good person.”

Ellis said Mangual had been in a movie called “Trapped.” According to www.imdb.com, Mangual played young Joshua in the 2022 film “Trapped in the Elevator” (originally, “Trapped”).

“Jericho was kind and outgoing,” Ellis said. “He wanted to make this comic book and he went to TWO22 every single Tuesday after school. He was overall a really kind person.”

Madden Hepfl had math class with him and they both were in band. He knew him best through TWO22. Last year, he remembered when some days Mangual would dress in suits and ties to match his fifth-grade teacher.

Hepfl said what stands out to him about Mangual is how he was calm and kind.

“He always made sure everyone wouldn’t bicker or fight,” he said. “He was a really kind person.”

Lacey Abshire called Mangual her best friend. She said he was forming a band with friends and had created a TikTok account. He was going to play drums and she was planning to play keyboard and three others also joined in the newly formed band. They didn’t have an opportunity to perform yet but were planning to play cover songs like Weezer.

“He was really nice,” Abshire said. “He loved to draw. He loves music and he’s just really nice and really sweet to everybody. He cared about friends and family and his teachers. He cared about everybody.”

Jase Miller became good friends with Mangual last year. They were in all their classes together. This year they sat at the same lunch table and played basketball together in the TWO22 program.

“This one time I remember these two kids were going to get into a fight and he stopped them because he didn’t want anyone to get hurt or injured,” Miller said.

He remembered how his friend loved art and he was always drawing in his notebook at lunch.

“He was loving and he cared about everybody else,” he said.
BMS social studies teacher Griffin Brown said a few weeks ago students participated in a field trip through TomTod Ideas and Mangual was in a group at the Diamond Match Party Center.
“He showed up to school that day – he was the only one – shirt and tie dressed as nice as he possibly could be and he came up to me and was like, ‘I’m ready to make an impression today.’ And I was like, ‘Look, I know you will,’ because that’s the kind of kid he is. And so when we were there he was asking questions, he was paying attention. You could tell he was interested in it. When we were done … when all the kids got up and walked out the door, he pushed his chair in, went over and found the owner, found the person who was running the TomTod side of it, shook their hand, thanked them for everything. Out of all those kids, he was the only one to show up dressed like that and he was the only one to go over and show manners like that. That stood out to me. … It was awesome to see that. That’s been him since the beginning of the school year. … He had a lot of potential.”

“That’s just how he is,” chimed in Melanie Blaz, intervention specialist who had two classes with him.

She told a story from the beginning of the year about how he was tired on a Monday and he told her he worked all weekend at a family member’s catering business.

“I go, ‘Well, did you get a lot of money?’ and he says, ‘oh, I didn’t do it for the money.’ He said, ‘I did it for the experience, so I can put it on my resume some day.’ You don’t get that out of a sixth grader. He was very well-liked. Great smile.”

Blaz said when she first found out he was in a movie she thought he was joking with her until he pulled up the IMDb website to show his name listed in the cast of the movie filmed in Cleveland. He used to live in New York and told her he also did modeling and was on Nickelodeon sets when he was younger.

“He’s very well liked,” she said. “He was very kind. Everybody loved him. All the kids loved him.”

Teachers agreed the week back after break was rough and staff members got together to talk before the students returned to classes, which helped.

“Any time Jericho saw me in the building he would say, how are you doing today, Mr. McKenney? He would just check up on everybody,” said Nathan McKenney, sixth-grade ELA teacher.
Mangual sat in the front row in his room.

“I’m definitely going to miss hearing his laugh in the classroom,” McKenney said.

According to Akron Police, Brandon T. Casto, 28, of Akron, turned himself in at the Meigs County Sheriff’s Office. A release stated that dispatch received many 911 calls, including one from a 49-year-old woman who fled the scene after being shot at by the suspect. She provided information that helped identify Casto as the suspect.

In one of the 911 call recordings obtained from the Akron Police, a woman is heard telling a dispatcher she was visiting with her friend who dropped her off at her driveway. She said the man approached them about being in the driveway and shot in the vehicle several times and shot at her. Officers responded to the shooting March 28 near 30 W Wilbeth Road and found a vehicle had crashed into the tree line on Hemlock Street, just south of W Wilbeth Road. The vehicle was partially on fire.

Both Tania Mangual, 47, and her son, Jericho, were found inside the vehicle with gunshot wounds, according to the Summit County Medical Examiner’s Office. Jericho Mangual was pronounced deceased at the scene and his mother was taken to a local hospital where she died from her injuries shortly afterward, the news release states.

A 2-year-old was located in the vehicle uninjured and was taken to the hospital as precaution. Detectives executed a search warrant at an apartment connected to the suspect and recovered firearms, firearm accessories and a large collection of ammunition, the Akron PD release states.

Casto is charged with two counts of aggravated murder and two counts of felonious assault with a weapon. He is in the Summit County Jail, according to Summit County Sheriff’s Office. Bond is set at $3 million. A grand jury hearing is scheduled for June 3, according to the Akron Municipal Court website.