Inset, top: Shakeela Martin (GoFundMe). Bottom insets, from left: Marcus Evans, Kyren Farmer and Jontez Young (Ferguson police). Background: The Missouri BP gas station where Martin was fatally shot (KMOV).
A late-night stop for celebratory slushies turned deadly for a Missouri mother of five, and now three young men are accused in the shooting that claimed her life.
Marcus Evans and Kyren Farmer, both 21, along with 19-year-old Jontez Young, have been charged in connection with the death of 35-year-old Shakeela Martin, according to police. The charges include second-degree murder, assault and firing a weapon from a motor vehicle.
Ferguson Police Chief Troy Doyle said investigators do not believe Martin was the person the gunmen meant to shoot.
“She wasn’t involved in any type of argument. She wasn’t involved in any type of dispute,” Doyle told reporters. “She wasn’t out in the streets. She’s just a good, loving mother.”
Martin had gone to a BP gas station in Ferguson shortly before midnight on June 30 with two of her children, ages 9 and 6, to buy slushies as the family marked a move into a new home. Police said she was leaving the store when the suspects pulled up in a vehicle and gunfire erupted. Authorities said one of the suspects had been involved in a dispute before the shooting.
Martin was pronounced dead at the scene by paramedics. Another man struck by the gunfire was hospitalized and has since been released, police said.
Doyle said the case weighed heavily on the Ferguson detectives working it. “Every homicide is important, but I think these [detectives] took it a lot more personal. And the reason it was personal was because, again, a loving mother had just come out of store trying to do what a mother does in regards to taking care of kids, and she ends up deceased as a result,” the police chief said.
Investigators used surveillance video to tie a Chevrolet Malibu to the shooting and identified Evans, Farmer and Young as the suspects. Police found bullets of the same brand and caliber at Young’s home as the shell casings recovered at the scene. Evans told cops he was inside the Malibu, while Farmer admitted to being the driver, authorities said.
St. Louis County Prosecutor Melissa Price Smith promised Martin’s family her office will try everything it can to deliver justice.
“There are truly, truly no words,” she said. “A mother should be able to go to a gas station and get slushies for her children without risking violence.”
The three suspects were arrested and taken to the St. Louis Detention Center on bonds of at least $2 million. They are set to appear in court on Thursday.
A GoFundMe described Martin as a devoted mother to five beautiful children who were the center of her world.
“She was full of love, strength, and hope for the future. In a heartbreaking twist of fate, she was preparing to move her family into their new home the very next day,” the description said. “Wanting to celebrate this exciting new chapter, she took her children to get slushies at a BP gas station. What should have been a joyful family moment became an unimaginable tragedy.”
The post ‘Trying to do what a mother does’: Mom of 5 buying slushies for her kids to celebrate moving into new home shot dead in front of them, cops say first appeared on Law & Crime.
