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Three teens killed in East Boston since Sept.

For the third time since September, East Boston has been rattled by the homicide of a teenage boy.

Sixteen-year-old Christofer Perez-De la Cruz died Sunday after he was found shot on Falcon Street about 1:36 a.m., Boston police said. He is the city’s first homicide victim of 2016.

“It’s terrible. Three teenagers murdered in [four] months,” said Boston City Councilor Salvatore LaMattina, who represents East Boston. “The residents are very, very concerned in East Boston about the last three homicides because they’re teenagers.”

The killing of Perez-De la Cruz follows the murder of two 15-year-old boys in separate attacks in September. Wilson Martinez was found stabbed to death on Constitution Beach on Sept. 7, a day before he was to begin his sophomore year at East Boston High School.

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Another boy, Irvin Javier de Paz Castro of Chelsea, suffered a fatal stab wound Sept. 20 on Trenton Street. No arrests have been made in the slayings.

The office of Suffolk District Attorney Daniel F. Conley declined to say whether police believe the killings are related. “It’s under investigation,” said Conley spokesman Jake Wark.

Investigators have yet to determine a motive for the attack on Perez-De la Cruz, said Lieutenant Detective Michael McCarthy, a Boston police spokesman.

LaMattina said police told him the shooting was not random. Relatives of Perez-De la Cruz could not be located Wednesday. A Boston Public Schools spokesman said there is no indication that Perez-De la Cruz was enrolled in the city school system.

LaMattina said he was troubled that Perez-De la Cruz was on the streets in the middle of the night.

“It’s really frustrating that a 16-year-old child. . . was murdered at 1:30 in the morning,” he said.

Before shots rang out, several neighbors said they heard loud noises coming from a car on Falcon Street. Some said they heard a gun fire three times.

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Lilliana Arteaga, 42, who lives near the scene, said she heard gunfire and called 911. Perez-De la Cruz stumbled along the length of a parked Toyota Sienna minivan before crumpling to the pavement near her front door, she said.

“I really just wanted to give this baby a hug,” Arteaga said Wednesday. “He was in so much pain.”

Blood stained the sidewalk and minivan, she said. Investigators scoured the street for ballistic evidence and recovered a hat and cellphone belonging to Perez-De la Cruz, Arteaga said. Officers have returned to Falcon Street several times since the shooting and have spoken to residents, according to neighbors.

“I have teenagers,” Arteaga said. “It’s scary.”

Another resident, Geiza Araujo, 33, said she was stunned by Perez-De la Cruz’s age.

“I told my husband, ‘He’s just a little kid.’ It’s really, really sad,” she said. “Maybe he didn’t have the chance to protect himself or to defend himself.”

Joshua Finet, 40, who also lives on Falcon Street, said he is troubled that violence appears to be affecting younger people.

“They keep getting younger. . . . It’s scary, frustrating,” he said. “There couldn’t have been any sensible reason as to why this happened.”

The Rev. John Nazzaro, executive director of the Salesian Boys & Girls Club of East Boston, said he has not heard any suggestions that the killings were related. The hundreds of children who go to the club are aware of the recent neighborhood violence but still feel safe, he said.

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One club member is the younger brother of Martinez, who was killed in September, Nazzaro said.

“My heart breaks when I hear this stuff,” he said. “Really, it’s terrible. You have your whole life ahead of you.”


Laura Crimaldi can be reached at laura.crimaldi@globe.com. Follow her on Twitter @lauracrimaldi.