Elyria man charged with manslaughter in teen's drowning

Editor's Note: This story has been updated to correct a timeline issue. ELYRIA — An Elyria man has been charged with involuntary manslaughter in the August drowning death of 16-year-old Vincent Pabon in the Black River Jacob Rosado, 24, was indicted on two counts of felony involuntary manslaughter and one charge of failure to comply with underage alcohol laws, an unclassified misdemeanor, on Friday by a Lorain County Common Pleas grand jury. The charges allege that Rosado provided alcohol to the underage Pabon, and that doing so contributed to Pabon's drowning death on the morning of Aug. 7 in the Black River beneath Elyria's East Falls. "Our thoughts and prayers are with the victim's family," Elyria Police Chief James Welsh said on Friday. "As law enforcement, we will continue to work diligently with the Prosecutor's Office to bring some closure to the family through a successful prosecution." Pabon, of Sheffield Lake, was last seen alive entering the woods beneath the East Falls Riverwalk with Rosado on the evening of Aug. 6. Security camera footage shows Rosado exiting the woods alone around 5 a.m. on the morning of Aug. 7. Rosado went to the Elyria Police Department at 8 a.m. that day and reported to officers that he and the teenager had been "hanging out" in the woods along the river when Pabon fell in and disappeared. Police said that Rosado admitted to providing alcohol to Pabon, and said the two had been in the woods all night. Pabon's body was recovered from the Black River on Aug. 9 after two days of search efforts from Elyria police and dive teams from Elyria fire and other departments. Rosado was arrested Aug. 7 after he stopped speaking with police. He was charged with felony tampering with evidence and misdemeanor contributing to the unruliness of a child and taken to the Lorain County Jail, where he remains on $150,000 bond. Earlier this month, Rosado was indicted by a grand jury on both those charges, as well as two additional felony charges of pandering obscenity involving a minor or impaired person and pandering sexually oriented material involving a minor. Welsh has previously told The Chronicle that these alleged incidents of pandering were discovered on Rosado's phone during the investigation, but were not connected to the investigation into Pabon's death. Those charges were filed against Rosado in a separate indictment and case, but both cases are before Lorain County Common Please Judge Chris Cook. On Friday, a supplemental indictment was filed in the tampering case, adding the involuntary manslaughter charges and the underage alcohol violation to the charges against Rosado. One manslaughter charge is connected to the contributing to the unruliness of a minor charge, while the failure to comply with underage alcohol laws is the underlying charge for the second manslaughter charge. Both manslaughter charges say that Rosado caused Pabon's death, and that this death was a "proximate result" of the violation of the connected misdemeanors. In 2021, when Rosado was 19, he was charged with felony gross sexual imposition, the crime of having sexual contact with a person who was younger than 13. He eventually pleaded guilty to a reduced charge of attempted criminal child enticement. Pabon's family has said that Pabon, who was 11 at the time, was the victim in that case. Court records support this claim. After Pabon's body was found on Aug. 9, Andre Fogo, a spokesman for the family, said he believed that Pabon had been "coerced and groomed" by Rosado. Rosado is set to appear in Cook's court on Nov. 3 for a pre-trial hearing. Contact Owen MacMillan at (440) 329-7123 or omacmillan@chroniclet.com.