By Michael Donoghue
Vermont News First
RUTLAND – Two Springfield, Mass. residents implicated in a fatal drug shooting of a Rutland man two years ago have dodged having their case considered for the federal death penalty, the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Vermont said Thursday.
Dylin “Slim” Wainscott, 30, and Precious “P” Okorie, 32, both of Springfield Mass. are charged in the latest federal indictment returned by a grand jury in Rutland this week, officials said.
Earlier Rutland County prosecutors charged Wainscott and Okorie in state court in connection with the fatal shooting of Christopher Hale, 32, of Rutland, who was shot outside a duplex at 17-19 Elm St. shortly after 7 p.m. Nov. 15, 2024.
Hale died about a half hour later at the Rutland Regional Medical Center, according to Police Officer Tim Rice. The autopsy showed the death was attributed to a gunshot wound to the torso, police said.
Wainscott and Okorie are now charged in federal court with the fatal shooting during the course of a conspiracy to distribute drugs in Vermont, officials said.
The new indictment also charged Dakota Moretti, 35, and Nichole Siliski, 40, both of Rutland with participating in that drug distribution conspiracy.
The U.S. Attorney’s Office said Thursday it filed a notice that it would not be seeking the death penalty in connection with these charges.
The announcement came one day after a new indictment for the first time charged Wainscott and Okorie with causing a death through the discharge of a firearm on Nov. 15, 2024 during the drug conspiracy.
If convicted, Okorie and Wainscott face a maximum of life in prison.
Siliski and Moretti face a maximum of 20 years in prison, if convicted.
Previously, the grand jury returned multiple indictments charging Wainscott with possession of ammunition as a convicted felon on November 15, 2024, charging Wainscott, Okorie, Siliski and Moretti with conspiring to distribute cocaine base and fentanyl, and charging Wainscott and Okorie with discharge of a firearm during the course of that drug conspiracy.
A previous federal indictment also charged Laryssa Johnson, 33, of Rutland with participating in the drug conspiracy. She pled guilty to that charge on December 16, 2025.
The defendants have been arrested, arraigned, and detained in connection with earlier indictments returned in this case.
They all will be arraigned on the new superseding indictment in the coming weeks.
Wainscott was originally arraigned on May 1, 2025, pleaded not guilty to the charge against him, and was detained pending trial.
Okorie was arraigned on July 21, pleaded not guilty to the charges against him, and was subsequently detained pending trial.
Siliski was arraigned on June 25, pleaded not guilty to the charges against her, and was detained.
Moretti was arrested on August 18, in South Carolina and was detained pending his transportation to Vermont to face charges against him.
According to state court records, Wainscott shot and killed Hale as he returned to a Rutland apartment shortly after 7 p.m. Nov. 15, 2024. For weeks prior to the shooting, Wainscott had been using that apartment to conduct his drug business in Vermont, officials said.
Wainscott worked for his supplier and childhood friend, Okorie, records show.
Johnson rented that apartment and assisted Wainscott and Okorie in the drug conspiracy. Moretti and Siliski were local drug users and dealers who also worked with Wainscott and Okorie to distribute drugs, officials said.
Court records state that approximately 10 days before the homicide, Wainscott was robbed at the Rutland apartment of drugs and drug proceeds at gunpoint, and pistol-whipped, by a rival drug dealer.
Following the robbery, Wainscott, Okorie, and Moretti worked together to locate the dealer and others they believed had stolen Wainscott and Okorie’s drugs and drug proceeds, records outline.
Believing the dealer was at and/or coming to the Rutland apartment on Nov. 15, 2024, Wainscott worked with Okorie and Moretti to find the person, police said.
About 7 p.m., the ultimate victim, who was not the rival dealer, returned to the apartment house. Multiple shots were fired from the area a few houses down, wounding and ultimately killing Hale.
Law enforcement found and arrested Wainscott and Okorie later that evening.
First Assistant U.S. Attorney Jonathan A. Ophardt commended the investigatory efforts of Homeland Security Investigations and Rutland City Police.
The federal prosecutors are Assistant U.S. Attorneys Michelle Arra and Dana Hill.
Wainscott has denied state charges of first-degree murder, conspiracy to commit first-degree murder and misdemeanor possession of a narcotic, authorities said.
He was initially jailed at the Northwest State Correctional Facility in St. Albans Town, but is now listed as being in an out-of-state facility.
Okorie, who also is known as “P-Gutta,” has pleaded not guilty in state court to charges of being an accessory before the fact and conspiracy to commit murder. He was held for about a month before Vermont Superior Court Judge Cortland Corsones released Okorie on conditions, including that he be placed in the custody of a responsible adult.
Rutland County State’s Attorney Ian Sullivan maintains Okorie had ordered Wainscott to shoot the first person coming out of the Elm Street residence. Unfortunately, Hale was walking near the house and had not exited the home when he was shot, according to Sullivan.
About 10 months after Okorie was released on conditions from Vermont Superior Court in Rutland, Massachusetts State Police arrested him on drug charges near Longmeadow, Mass., after stopping his black Ford F-150 truck, records show.
About 4 ounces of suspected cocaine and a sublingual film of Buprenorphine Naloxone (Suboxone) were seized as evidence from the truck about 10:50 a.m. Sept. 11, 2025, Rutland Police stated in court papers.
Investigators also found a hollowed out area by the truck’s glove compartment believed to be a hidden stash site.
Two Apple iPhones were seized and investigators applied for a search warrant to check the devices for evidence of possession of drugs with intent to distribute and conspiracy to distribute drugs, according to Rutland Detective Cpl. Adam Lucia, who is assigned to the Department of Homeland Security Task Force in Vermont.
Wainscott was initially charged in a federal criminal complaint filed by Lucia in September 2024 with illegal possession of .40-caliber Smith & Wesson ammunition on Nov. 15, 2024, the day of the homicide in Rutland City, records show.
Wainscott’s criminal record included at least two prior felony convictions for possession to distribute heroin and possession with intent to distribute cocaine, Lucia said in a court affidavit.
Lucia wrote Wainscott received two years of probation for both those earlier cases in Hampden Superior Court in Massachusetts.
Arra, one of the federal prosecutors, wrote in a five-page detention motion that Wainscott needed jailing in the federal case because he was a danger to the community and a risk to flee. She stated he had open criminal cases in Massachusetts for assault and battery on police, witness intimidation and assault with a dangerous weapon. He also had an extensive history of violating conditions of release, she said.
The Rutland Police homicide investigation indicated Hale was not the intended target. Wainscott was looking for a rival drug dealer involved in a previously unreported drug rip-off and possible shooting, court records show.
Those court records identified Joshua Acosta, a suspected narcotics dealer in the Rutland area, as the intended target for “Slim” Wainscott.
“I was aware of unconfirmed law enforcement intelligence that indicated that Acosta and ‘Slim’ had a disagreement approximately a week prior. According to that intelligence, Acosta had shot ‘Slim’ when robbing ‘Slim’ of his drug stash at 19 Elm Street,” Lucia said in a federal affidavit.
Dakota Moretti, a witness, reported that he had picked up Wainscott that evening and advised he was looking to find “Josh” and wanted to “set Josh up,” which Moretti understood to mean arranged to have him killed, Lucia wrote.
Moretti reported that after the shooting outside the duplex on Elm Street, Wainscott got in the car and indicated he had shot the first person that looked like Josh.
“Moretti advised ‘Slim’ started he had seven shots and had made all seven count,” Lucia wrote.
Investigators found OxyContin pills on Wainscott during the arrest, and he did not have a prescription and were not in a properly labeled container, Lucia wrote.
Police impounded two vehicles, including one that was stopped near Walmart after the shooting. Search warrants were authorized by a judge for the vehicles as Sullivan, the prosecutor, worked with investigators throughout the weekend.
The shooting was thought to be the latest in the ongoing connection of illegal activities — drugs and/or guns — flowing between Rutland and Springfield, Massachusetts, area, officials said.
Wainscott was arrested in June 2017 as part of a seizure of nearly 1,000 bags of heroin in Westfield, Massachusetts, police in his hometown reported at the time.
Okorie also is known to police in multiple states. In a recent case, he was arrested in South Windsor, Connecticut, for reportedly breaking into a home in an attempt to collect rent to which he was not entitled, according to police in December 2023, records show.
Okorie was charged with two counts of risk of injury to a child, first-degree burglary, second-degree criminal trespass, criminal attempt to commit second-degree larceny, third-degree identity theft, criminal impersonation, second-degree forgery and criminal misrepresentation, police said. He was released after posting $100,000 bond, according to news accounts.
He has two convictions from 2016 in Cheshire County, New Hampshire, for charges of being an accomplice to theft by deception and for possession of false identification, according to the Keene Sentinel.