A man and a teenage boy face murder charges in what prosecutors say was a planned robbery that ended with a 17-year-old shot dead in a Wicker Park alley. Dauveyae White, 18, and Melvin Thomas, 17, are each charged with murder and armed robbery in the November 15 killing of Xavier Colletti, 17, whose body was found in the alley behind the 1500 block of North Honore Street.
Surveillance video from around 1:44 a.m. captures a Jeep pulling to a stop in the alley. White steps out of the back seat holding a rifle and fires it into the open door, then watches as Colletti climbs out and tries to run, prosecutors said. White allegedly fired again as Colletti fled and fell to the pavement.
As White climbed back into the Jeep, Thomas allegedly got out of the vehicle wearing a hoodie with the word “DEATH” printed across the front. Prosecutors said he ran to where Colletti lay on the ground, and bent down, until a male voice is heard on the footage saying, “I got the pad, I got the pad, come on.” Thomas then returned to the Jeep, and it drove away.
“He was lured into an alley, set up, and left to take his last breath alone,” relatives of Colletti said in a GoFundMe campaign.
Chicago police officers responding to a shots-fired call found Colletti unresponsive in the alley. He died a short time later. Investigators recovered multiple rifle casings and Colletti’s phone at the scene.
That phone became central to the case. Prosecutors say one of Colletti’s Instagram accounts contained messages with a user whose associated phone number is registered to a grandparent of Thomas. The messages, sent the night of the killing, show the two were making plans to meet up. One message included a request for Colletti to bring his “pro pad,” a device prosecutors say can be used to steal cars.
Prosecutors said Colletti and White had once been arrested together in a stolen vehicle.
When police later recovered White’s phone during an unrelated arrest, they found screenshots of those same Thomas-Colletti conversations, along with separate messages between White and Thomas that prosecutors say show the two men conspiring to rob Colletti.
Cell phone location data for both men placed them in the area of the murder at the time of the shooting, and the data tracked with the Jeep’s movements before, during, and after the killing, according to prosecutors. Investigators allegedly found a video on Thomas’ social media in which he appears to be wearing the same “DEATH” hoodie seen in the surveillance footage.
Thomas has a significant history in the juvenile justice system. Prosecutors said he was arrested in January 2025 while fleeing a stolen vehicle that had just been used in an armed robbery, pleaded guilty to a gun charge, and received juvenile probation. Less than a month later, he was arrested again for possessing a stolen motor vehicle and again received juvenile probation. He was on both of those probations at the time of Colletti’s killing. Officials said he also had a juvenile adjudication for possessing a stolen vehicle in 2022.
Judge Shauna Boliker detained Thomas on Monday.
White’s full criminal background was not immediately available, but he is currently in custody in DuPage County following a February arrest on allegations of possessing a machine gun. Court records also show outstanding warrants in two Cook County burglary cases.
“Xavier was not alone in this world! He was loved by many!” the GoFundMe authors wrote.”He touched many hearts with his beautiful smile and contagious laughter. He was such an intelligent and inspirational young man. We were blessed with him for a wonderful 17 years although short-lived, we know his spirit will live on through all of us who truly loved him!”
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