In the early morning hours of what seemed like an ordinary day, Dewenzel James Spence, a 41-year-old man, began his walk from his home in southeast Atlanta to the Five Points MARTA station, a routine journey to his job at Hormel Foods. This particular morning, on May 31, 2016, his path took a tragic and unforeseen turn. Spence was intercepted and forced into a minivan by two individuals. His abductors then drove him to a Bank of America ATM on Veterans Memorial Highway in Mableton, where he was compelled to withdraw money. After the robbery, he was taken to a nearby wooded area off Queens Mill Road and fatally shot. His body, in a state of advanced decomposition, was discovered a few days later, on June 3, 2016.
For years, the case grew cold, leaving investigators with little more than surveillance images from the ATM. The photos showed two men with Spence, one of whom had his face partially obscured. The case remained a mystery until January 2020, when a breakthrough came through the use of facial recognition software. The technology successfully identified the unmasked suspect as Terrance Marshall. This crucial lead allowed detectives to then identify the second individual as Dontavian Jones. At the time of the murder, Marshall was 19 years old, and Jones was only 14. Both were from Cochran, Georgia, and it was later revealed that Marshall was helping Jones flee an outstanding murder warrant from their hometown.
The investigation uncovered that shortly after Spence's murder, the pair had been involved in a high-speed chase in Alabama in a white van similar to the one seen in the ATM surveillance footage. Following their arrests in 2020, the judicial process began. In January 2024, Terrance Marshall was convicted for his role in the crime and received a sentence of life in prison without the possibility of parole, with an additional five years. A few months later, in June 2024, Dontavian Jones was also found guilty by a Cobb County jury on multiple charges, including murder, kidnapping, armed robbery, aggravated assault, and possession of a firearm during the commission of a felony. His sentencing was scheduled for the following month. The convictions brought a long-awaited resolution to the senseless and violent end of an innocent, hardworking father's life.
