A jury has found Peter "PJ" Clabron III not guilty of manslaughter and other charges in the 2023 shooting death of his former teammate, Jeremiah Aviles. The verdict was reached on July 1, concluding a trial that began on June 9 and ended with closing arguments on June 30. Clabron, now 21, was acquitted of manslaughter, negligent homicide, and unlawful discharge of a firearm.
The case centered on the events of May 7, 2023, when Aviles, 18, was fatally shot inside a bedroom at Clabron’s home near Gilbert Road and University Drive in Mesa. Mesa is about 16 miles northwest of Queen Creek. Police initially reported that Clabron called 911 to state that a gun had discharged and the individual holding it had fled.
Prosecutors built their case around the testimony of Champ Gennicks, a teen who was present in the room. Deputy Maricopa County Attorney John Hudson told jurors that Gennicks maintained Clabron was handling a loaded weapon while intoxicated when it fired. Hudson argued that Gennicks had no motive to lie about shooting a close friend and noted that Clabron dropped the weapon after the shot. The prosecution also disputed the defense theory that another teen, Hector Hernandez, fired the shot, noting Hernandez was in the bathroom at the time and later fled with two other firearms. Hernandez died by suicide in 2025.
The defense challenged the reliability of Gennicks’s account, arguing that forensic evidence contradicted his story. Attorney Gary Nielsen pointed out discrepancies between Gennicks’s description of the room’s layout and autopsy findings, bullet trajectory, and blood patterns. Nielsen noted that medical evidence indicated Aviles was shot from behind, contrary to Gennicks’s claim that he faced Clabron. The defense also highlighted blood evidence on Hernandez’s shorts, the absence of gunshot residue testing, and questions regarding whether the firearm could have misfired.
