Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...

An Austin 18-year-old arrested and charged with felony firearm possession has been found to have a connection to the 16-year-old accused of killing Opoka James Bot Lob Nathanael and injuring one other in February.

Owyn Enrique Raul Bellikka was in Mower County District Court for a first appearance Friday morning and is currently being held in Mower County District court on $250,000 bail or bond with no conditions and $25,000 with conditions.

The connection comes from data obtained by an Austin Police Department detective from a cellphone seized during the investigation into the Feb. 15 shooting death of Nathanael.

According to the court complaint, the cellphone was recovered from the back of the vehicle in which Nathanael was shot. Photos and video taken from the phone allegedly show the juvenile charged in the February shooting brandishing a .45 handgun

Other video and pictures showed the juvenile and others possessing and firing handguns while also having text conversations about firing handguns.

A text conversation just five days before the fatal shooting on Feb. 10 to a “Crowyn” included three photos of the gun handled by the juvenile as well as the juvenile asking “U had got the bullets.”

Responding texts show Crowyn responding by saying he was pulling up and “let me come in.”

Two days later, on Feb. 12, Cowyn sent the juvenile a video in which the video taker appears to be the juvenile who is sitting in the passenger seat of the vehicle. The video was focused on the gun that appears to be the same weapon from days previous before the juvenile steps out and fires five rounds on the side of the road. 

Then, turning to the vehicle, the juvenile appears to hand the gun to Bellikka, who reaches out across the interior of the car and shoots the gun three more times out of the open door of the passenger side.

The detective and an officer went to the location the phone was tracked to near 31st Street NW north of 12th Avenue NW and south of 20th Avenue NW in Austin and discovered six .45 bullet casings.

On March 6, Bellikka was arrested in the 700 block of Ninth Avenue SW, but declined to speak to law enforcement. 

According to the complaint, Bellikka was previously adjudicated delinquent for second degree assault with a dangerous weapon in July of 2023.

The Mower County Attorney’s Office is attempting to move the case of the juvenile charged with second degree murder to be charged as an adult. He was arrested just hours after the fatal shooting took place in the 1100 block of Fifth Avenue NW.