Army soldier Brandon Wilson had been looking forward to spending Veterans Day weekend with his girlfriend, Jayne Salazar-Chavez. But when he arrived outside her home, he quickly sensed something was wrong: she did not appear happy to see him.
The reason soon emerged. Salazar-Chavez had been communicating with another man, and after Wilson angrily confronted that man over the phone, gunfire erupted. Wilson was injured in the shooting, while 17-year-old Salazar-Chavez was killed.
“When it comes to someone young like that,” DeKalb County Police Master Officer Irving Huynh said on the July 25 episode of Oxygen’s The Real Murders of Atlanta, “it always hits a little harder.”
Who Was Jayne Salazar-Chavez?
Salazar-Chavez was well known at Towers High School, where she had been crowned homecoming queen and participated in the school’s Air Force JROTC program. Those who knew her remembered her as kind, grounded and seemingly without enemies.
As investigators began piecing together the attack, Wilson described the hours that led up to the deadly shooting.
Wilson told police he picked up Salazar-Chavez from her home at about 11:30 p.m. The couple argued after he saw a suggestive text message she had received from another man. Hoping to calm the situation, they drove around, but the dispute escalated when Wilson called the man and the two argued about who was actually Salazar-Chavez’s boyfriend.
Wilson said that when he brought Salazar-Chavez back home, he spotted a figure near her mailbox and noticed a red laser aimed at his car. Relying on his military training, he shifted into reverse, but the person began shouting and opened fire, sending about 20 bullets into the vehicle.
As Wilson sped through the neighborhood trying to escape, he heard Salazar-Chavez scream.
“She was choking on her blood,” Wilson told police in audio footage. “Then I called 911.”
Wilson, who had been shot in the knee, drove to a nearby gas station, where he met paramedics. Despite life-saving measures, Salazar-Chavez died within five minutes.
After Wilson was ruled out as a suspect, detectives turned their attention to Salazar-Chavez’s phone.
“Whoever was arguing on the phone,” said Huynh, “that’s where the motive is pointing toward.”
The Hidden Clue in Jayne Salazar-Chavez’s Journal
One obstacle remained: Salazar-Chavez’s phone was locked, and no one knew the password. As DeKalb County Patrol Officer Anthony Little pointed out, “That’s one thing that could make or break the case.”
While waiting on a search warrant for call records, investigators searched Salazar-Chavez’s bedroom.
The search uncovered her journal, which contained a number that turned out to be the passcode to her phone.
“That’s luck,” noted Huynh. “That’s a big break in the case.”
A selfie on Salazar-Chavez’s phone, taken a few days before the shooting, also became a key piece of evidence. An unidentified man also appeared in the photo, along with a firearm, stuck between the driver’s seat and the center console.
Detectives showed the photo to Salazar-Chavez’s loved ones, but no one recognized him.
An anonymous tip soon followed.
“This person actually was keeping track of the case on the news,” said Huynh. “They told us we should look into…a guy named Nakia Dorsey.”
Who Killed Jayne Salazar-Chavez?
Detectives pulled up 23-year-old Dorsey’s driver’s license photo and compared it to the man in the selfie, which was a match. They also obtained a search warrant for Dorsey’s last known address and went to question him, but he wasn’t home.
Inside were multiple firearms, though none matched the murder weapon. Authorities also recovered three cell phones—one of which was used to call Salazar-Chavez on the night she was killed—while location data placed Dorsey at the crime scene.
In early 2023, Dorsey was arrested and charged with murder.
Although Dorsey refused to speak to police, investigators concluded his motive was jealousy.
“There is kind of a love triangle,” DeKalb County District Attorney Investigator Aria Lynch said in the episode. “These two men are both dating—in their minds—Jayne. They ended up fighting, arguing, and getting riled up on the phone in the car to the point where Nakia Dorsey, an avid gun owner, went out to her house.”
Dorsey went on trial for murder in August 2023, and the jury delivered a guilty verdict. He was sentenced to life in prison, plus 25 years to run consecutively.
