Murder had Marblehead schools on high alert

MARBLEHEAD – Marblehead police were ready to protect the schools if an accused murderer came to town.Shortly before Thursday night’s School Committee meeting, Police Chief Robert Picariello met with Superintendent of Schools Paul Dulac in the media room adjacent to the Marblehead High library, a location where they could speak in private.At Dulac’s urging, the arriving committee members quickly voted to meet in executive session with the chief. They met for about 10 minutes and began their meeting late.The subject of their meeting was Marblehead native Stephen P. Morgan, 29, whose last known address was in Swampscott, sought in the shooting death of 21-year-old Wesleyan student Johanna Justin-Jinich. She was shot several times Wednesday by a gunman wearing a wig at Broad Street Books, a popular Wesleyan University student bookstore in Middletown, Conn. Justin-Jinich was a junior at the school and worked at the store.Less than two hours after their meeting with the chief, Morgan was taken into custody at a Cumberland Farms convenience store in Meriden, about 10 miles from the shooting scene. He called Meriden police shortly before 9:15 p.m. and turned himself in.But local police, unaware of his whereabouts until that news was broadcast, were ready if he were to return home.As the longer-than-usual committee meeting concluded about 10:30 p.m., Chairman Amy Drinker alluded to the murder as “a Connecticut tragedy with a North Shore connection” and Dulac announced that school principals had “a heightened awareness” of the situation and parents dropping children off at school Friday morning could expect to see more police at the schools.