In the early hours of July 16, 2012, a night out in Boston's South End theater district turned fatal for 29-year-old Daniel de Abreu, a Black / African American male. De Abreu and his friend, Safiro Furtado, were shot and killed in a drive-by shooting while stopped at a red light. The two men, friends who had served in the military together in Cape Verde before immigrating to the United States, were pronounced dead at the scene.
A third person in their vehicle was wounded in the attack, while two others fled unharmed.
The investigation into the double homicide eventually led police to a prominent suspect: former New England Patriots tight end Aaron Hernandez. Prosecutors alleged that the deadly encounter stemmed from a minor incident earlier in the evening at Cure Lounge, a Boston nightclub. It was claimed that de Abreu accidentally bumped into Hernandez on the dance floor, causing him to spill his drink. According to the prosecution's narrative, this seemingly trivial event was perceived as a sign of disrespect by Hernandez, who then allegedly waited for de Abreu and his friends to leave the club and followed them.
The case against Hernandez largely relied on the testimony of his former friend, Alexander Bradley, who was with him on the night of the shootings. Bradley claimed that Hernandez, enraged by the nightclub encounter, opened fire on the vehicle carrying de Abreu and Furtado. Prosecutors also accused Hernandez of later shooting Bradley in the face in an attempt to silence him as a witness. A silver SUV, allegedly driven by Hernandez that night, was later found hidden at a relative's home in Connecticut.
During the trial, Hernandez's defense team presented an alternative theory, pointing the finger directly at Alexander Bradley as the shooter. They argued that the motive was not a spilled drink, but a drug deal gone wrong, and portrayed Bradley as an unreliable drug dealer with a criminal record who had been given an immunity deal to testify. After more than 37 hours of deliberation, a jury found Aaron Hernandez not guilty of the murders of Daniel de Abreu and Safiro Furtado in April 2017. He was, however, convicted of unlawful possession of a firearm and sentenced to an additional four to five years in prison, separate from the life sentence he was already serving for the 2013 murder of Odin Lloyd.
