Dorchester man to spend rest of life in prison for killing childhood friend he thought was a snitch

The Supreme Judicial Court today upheld Frankie Herndon's conviction for fatally shooting his childhood friend, Derrick Barnes, in 2011 because he thought Barnes had snitched on him two years earlier.

The ruling means Herndon, 32, will spend the rest of his life in prison without the chance of parole.

The court ruled that issues raised by Herndon's lawyers about eyewitness testimony were important enough to order changes in the way witnesses are dealt with in future Massachusetts cases, but that they did not prove serious enough to warrant a new trial.

For example, Suffolk County prosecutors had a Boston Police detective testify about how a witness fingered Herndon, then they put the witness on the stand and he testified he did not recall talking to detectives. In the future, the state's highest court ruled, prosecutors should put third-party witnesses such as detectives on the stand only after obtaining testimony from the direct witnesses.

In Herndon's case, the court ruled, that wouldn't have mattered, because the witness was on a prosecution witness list provided to defense attorneys, who had the chance to challenge him in court, and they didn't.

According to the decision, Herndon and Barnes were childhood friends who spent nearly every day together until 2009 - when Herndon was arrested and blamed Barnes for snitching on him and another man, Frederick Henderson. Barnes moved out of they Fayston Street neighborhood, but returned on Aug. 27, 2011 with his brother to visit friends.

Barnes was on a friend's porch around 7 p.m. when Herndon and Henderson, walking down the street, spotted him and got into an argument with him over his alleged snitching. Herndon and Henderson pulled out guns and shot him four times, hitting him in the head. The two began to walk away, but turned around and saw the dying Barnes raise his arm. Herndon shot him again.

A Suffolk Superior Court jury convicted Herndon and Henderson of first-degree murder in 2013.