The bodies of Atlanta Deveney and her 12-year-old son Elijah Rosado remained undiscovered in their Wissinoming apartment for two days after her boyfriend, Carlos Rivera, strangled Deveney and stabbed the boy to death.
Then, according to Rivera’s alleged statement to homicide detectives, the killer returned to the scene, stuffed the two victims into a closet with a bloody mattress and set the place on fire.
During Rivera’s preliminary hearing on murder and arson charges on Nov. 26, Assistant District Attorney Lorraine Donnelly argued that Rivera set the blaze in an attempt to destroy evidence of the slayings.
But Rivera allegedly offered a different explanation to investigators.
“I lit the fire so that someone would find them,” Rivera said, according to his signed police statement.
At the conclusion of the preliminary hearing, Municipal Court Judge David C. Shuter ordered Rivera, 26, to stand trial for two counts of murder, arson, abuse of corpse and related offenses.
The murders occurred on Oct. 3 in an apartment on the 4600 block of Howell St. Rivera’s statement to police was the lone piece of evidence introduced at the hearing. In it, Rivera allegedly claimed he was high on PCP and Brandy when he began arguing with Deveney, 35, at about 4 a.m. Rivera entered what he called a “blind rage,” and strangled the woman. He then went into Rosado’s bedroom and stabbed the boy because, as Rivera allegedly told police, “I didn’t want to see him without his mother.”
Defense attorney Richard J. Giuliani reportedly said the couple had been together for about four years and that Rivera has a history of mental illness. The defender acknowledged that his client’s actions and his explanations for them were “bizarre.”
Rivera remains in jail at Curran-Fromhold Correctional Facility without bail. He is scheduled for an arraignment in Common Pleas Court on Dec. 17. ••
