Drug ripoff gone fatally wrong leaves questions from Miami to Canada

Even in bullet-scarred Miami, a $4,800 deal over two pounds of marijuana rarely ends in a bloody daytime shootout — particularly one involving teenagers.

But the small-time drug buy went bad in a big way last week, leaving two young men from very different worlds dead, two others wounded and an entire country to the north wondering what went wrong with two Canadian kids in sunny Miami.

Marc and Jean Wabafiyebazu, privileged teenage sons of an admired Canadian diplomat, left private school in frigid Ottawa to follow their mother into the balmy embrace of South Florida. Within weeks, it seems, they had fashioned themselves into gun-toting toughs, with police saying they planned a ripoff of low-level pot peddlers last Monday afternoon.

A small group waited inside a small Coral Way apartment to make the deal, including Joshua Wright, nicknamed “Obama” for his passing resemblance to the president. The 17-year-old was a gregarious teen who had been kicked out of Coral Gables High but had no criminal record.

How did they all meet? Who pitched the deal? Who shot first? Investigators are working to nail down evidence in a case drawing intense media interest in Canada. Miami-Dade prosecutors already are preparing to push forward on felony murder charges.

http://www.miamiherald.com/news/local/crime/article17443508.html