In the late hours of a Friday night in Macon, Georgia, 18-year-old Jamaya Brianna Warner was driving near the intersection of Dellwood Drive and Dellwood Court when shots were fired at her vehicle. A bullet struck the young woman, who had recently graduated from Westside High School with dreams of joining the military. Despite being gravely wounded, she and her 21-year-old male passenger managed to drive to a Circle K convenience store on Thomaston Road. It was there, in the parking lot, that Jamaya succumbed to her injuries and was pronounced dead on August 20, 2022. Her passenger was unharmed in the incident.
The Bibb County Sheriff's Office began an investigation into the shooting that cut short a life so full of promise. Friends and family remembered Jamaya as a beautiful and goofy person who was the life of the party. Her mother, Brittany Goolsby, and her father, Jimmy Lee Warner, were left to mourn the sudden and violent loss of their daughter, who had turned 18 just thirty days prior to her death. The community held vigils and a balloon release in her memory, calling for an end to the senseless violence that had claimed another young life in their city.
Several months later, in October 2022, authorities announced a significant development in the case. Investigators charged 21-year-old Matthew Milner Jr. with the murder of Jamaya Brianna Warner. At the time the charges were brought against him, Milner was already incarcerated at the Bibb County Jail on unrelated charges of Aggravated Assault and Possession of a Firearm During the Commission of a Felony. He was being held without bond for Jamaya's murder.
