LOCKPORT — Jury selection is underway in the in the murder trial of a Falls man accused of gunning down another man on the 2000 block of 18th Street in June 2023.
Niagara County prosecutors and the defense attorney for Juan Ubiles agreed on five of what will ultimately be 12 jurors and two alternates who will hear the case. Lawyers said they were optimistic that a full jury could be seated today and opening statements could begin on Friday morning.
Ubiles, who fled from the Falls after the incident, is set to stand trial on a grand jury indictment that charges him with second-degree murder and second-degree criminal possession of a weapon in the shooting death of Gregory Vincent. He has pleaded not guilty to the charges and is being held without bail pending his trial.
The Falls man had been the subject of an intense manhunt by Falls Police Criminal Investigation Division (CID) detectives and U.S. Marshals before being captured in Philadelphia, almost three months after the slaying of Vincent. A U.S. Marshals task force in Philadelphia, acting on a tip from the marshals’ Western New York Violent Felony Fugitive Task Force, apprehended Ubiles without incident.
The Western New York task force had conducted a series of searches for Ubiles in the Rochester area in the days immediately after Vincent’s slaying without success. The local Crime Stoppers program also posted a reward of up to $2,000 for information leading to his “arrest or indictment.
Ubiles, 39, is accused of gunning down Vincent at around 11:38 a.m. on June 19, 2023 in the 2000 block of 18th Street.
Falls Police patrol officers said they responded to a report of “a person shot” near the intersection of 18th Street and Niagara Avenue. When they arrived, the officers said they found Vincent, 44, lying on the apron of a driveway and suffering from multiple gunshot wounds to his chest. Witnesses reported hearing three gunshots and then discovering the victim.
Vincent was rushed to Niagara Falls Memorial Medical Center where he was pronounced dead.
Investigators later revealed that Ubiles had tried to kill Vincent almost 13 years earlier, during a shootout and high-speed chase in August 2010.
Ubiles was caught after that incident, convicted on a weapons possession charge and served just five years probation for his crime.
If Ubiles is convicted on his current charges he could face 25 years to life in prison.