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Two charged with Spring Lake teen's murder

Harnett County authorities charged two Fort Bragg soldiers with murder and disposing of a corpse after a Spring Lake teen was found in a wooded area near the Cumberland County line.

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SPRING LAKE, N.C. — Harnett County authorities charged two men Thursday night with murder and disposing of a corpse after a Spring Lake teen was found earlier in the day in a wooded area near the Cumberland County line. 

Both suspects – Spc. Christopher Roger Blackett and Pvt. Sebastian Gamez – are soldiers based at Fort Bragg. The 20-year-olds live at 102 Carmichael Lane in Spring Lake. Both were held Friday without bond at the Harnett County Detention Center.

Deputies from the two counties found the body of Vincent Carlisle Jr., 17, in some woods off Shady Grove Road in Harnett County four days after he left home and did not return.

A spokeswoman for the Cumberland County Sheriff's Office said Carlisle's body was taken to the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner for an autopsy.

Melanie Stewart, principal of Johnathan's House Christian School in Fuquay-Varina, said Carlisle had transferred there after attending Overhills High in Spring Lake. He was a rising senior in the Class of 2012. 

She said Carlisle had been subject to peer pressure at Overhills.

"The way he explained it to me was that it wasn't cool to do good in school," she said.

"He knew he didn’t belong with a crowd that wasn’t going anywhere, but he did not know how to break away from it either," she said. "I think he needed an opportunity for somebody to give him a chance to start over."

Carlisle had done that at Johnathan's House Christian School, she said.

"He told me he was looking forward to school in the fall, and he wanted to graduate and get on with his life," Stewart said. "It’s important to me that people know that Vincent Carlisle was a very intelligent young man, and he had dreams, and he had plans." 

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