In the afternoon hours of October 21, 2019, a burst of gunfire shattered the quiet of a residential street in University City, a suburb of Saint Louis, Missouri. When police responded to reports of shots fired near the intersection of Kingsland Avenue and Corbitt Avenue around 3:45 p.m., they discovered 19-year-old David Anderson Jr. in the yard of a home on Kingsland, suffering from multiple gunshot wounds.
He was rushed to a nearby hospital but ultimately succumbed to his injuries.
The investigation into the death of the young man, who was a male, quickly pointed to a tragic case of mistaken identity and retaliatory violence. Evidence and testimony presented in court would later reveal that Anderson was not the intended target. The shooting was in retaliation for a separate shooting that had occurred in St. Louis County the day before, an event in which Anderson had no involvement. Investigators determined that a group of men had approached Anderson with the intent to shoot him.
The ensuing police work led to the arrests of several individuals connected to the fatal shooting. One of the first to be charged was Deronte McDaniels, who was 21 at the time. He faced charges of first-degree murder and armed criminal action. McDaniels later pleaded guilty to a federal charge of conspiracy to possess a firearm in furtherance of drug trafficking and admitted to being one of the men who shot at Anderson. He was subsequently sentenced to 150 months in prison.
Further investigation led to the conviction of Deoman Reeves, a man from East St. Louis, Illinois, on 11 felony charges, including one count of possession of a firearm in furtherance of drug trafficking resulting in death. In March 2024, Reeves was sentenced to life in prison plus 15 years for his role in a fentanyl trafficking operation and the murder of David Anderson. A third man, Franklin Bell, also faced charges related to the drug conspiracy and the events surrounding Anderson's death. He pleaded guilty to several fentanyl and firearm charges and was sentenced to 20 years in prison. Another individual, Arrion Jones, was also implicated and sentenced to 40 months in prison.
