In the late morning hours of February 21, 2017, a burst of gunfire in the Dorchester Manor neighborhood of North Charleston, South Carolina, set in motion a chain of events that would ultimately claim the life of a young man. Twenty-one-year-old Jaquan Dakim Jones was with two other people when they were approached by a group with the intent to commit armed robbery. During the encounter, shots were fired, and Jones was struck.
One of the suspects, a teenager, was also wounded in the exchange.
Emergency services arrived at the scene on Pine Grove Drive to find Jaquan Jones critically injured. He was rushed to Trident Medical Center for treatment. For weeks, he fought for his life, but his injuries proved too severe. On Saturday, March 11, 2017, Jaquan Dakim Jones, a male, succumbed to his wounds and was pronounced dead, turning an attempted robbery investigation into a homicide case. His death left his family and the community grappling with the senseless violence that had taken him.
The Dorchester County Sheriff's Office led the investigation into the shooting. Within days of the incident, authorities identified their primary suspect as 20-year-old Lakedren Terrell Amaru Thompson of North Charleston. Thompson was arrested and initially charged with three counts of attempted murder, armed robbery, and possession of a firearm during the commission of a violent crime. Following Jones's death, questions arose as to whether the charges against Thompson would be upgraded to murder.
Two 16-year-old males were also identified as being with Thompson at the time of the attempted robbery. One of the teenagers was hospitalized with a gunshot wound and was considered a suspect in the case. The other teenager was deemed a person of interest by the sheriff's office. In the immediate aftermath, charges had not yet been filed against the two teens, and their level of involvement in the fatal shooting remained a focus of the ongoing investigation. The subsequent legal proceedings and final dispositions for all three individuals are not readily available in public online sources.
