Ashley Nichole Blackmon was a 24-year-old woman from the small community of Hamer in Dillon County, South Carolina. She was born on May 20, 1994, and grew up rooted in the area, the daughter of Robert Lee Blackmon and Tonya Moore Blackmon. She worked as a waitress at the Del Sol Restaurant, balancing the demands of her job with the responsibilities of being a young mother to her daughter, Darriyana La’Shye Rushing.
Her life was closely intertwined with her extended family: parents in nearby towns, siblings, and grandparents who formed a tight circle of support around her. In late November 2018, plans were in place for her funeral at Cooper Funeral Home Chapel in Dillon, with burial at Greenlawn Cemetery, a somber testament to how abruptly her life had been cut short.
On the evening of Friday, November 23, 2018, just before 7:30 p.m., Dillon County deputies were dispatched to Queen Court in the Tall Pines community of Hamer after reports of shots fired and a person having been shot. The residential street, just off Highway 301 near Smith Road and Second Baptist Church, became the scene of a devastating crime. When law enforcement arrived, they found a woman who had been shot and was already deceased inside a residence. The Dillon County coroner later identified her as Ashley Blackmon of the Hamer area, confirming that she had died as a result of gunshot wounds. The quiet of the community was shattered that night as word spread that a young mother who had been part of everyday life in Dillon County was gone.
Investigators with the Dillon County Sheriff’s Office quickly focused on a suspect. That same night, 28-year-old Jamel Rasun Dow of Hamer was arrested and charged with murder in connection with Ashley’s death and taken to the Dillon County Detention Center to await a bond hearing. Over the following months, the case moved through the justice system, with prosecutors building a picture of what had happened inside the home on Queen Court. In court, Assistant 4th Circuit Solicitor Shipp Daniel later explained that Ashley had been shot six times, including once in the head, emphasizing the brutality of the killing. In October 2019, Dow pleaded guilty and was sentenced to 42 years in prison for her death, bringing a measure of legal finality to a crime that had stunned the community.
At the sentencing hearing, prosecutors described the killing as a senseless tragedy that did not have to happen, and public statements acknowledged the strength and dignity shown by the Blackmon family throughout the ordeal. While no prison term could restore what was lost, the lengthy sentence was presented as an attempt at justice for Ashley and those who loved her. Outside the courtroom, her memory lived on not only through her daughter and family but also in public memorials that recorded her as one of many lives lost to gun violence on that November day in 2018. In the days immediately following her death, as friends and relatives gathered for visitation and her funeral service in Dillon, the formal rituals of mourning unfolded alongside the knowledge that the person responsible had been arrested and, in time, would be held accountable, even as the emotional weight of her absence remained. 21
