Jonathan Denzel “Jaye” Smith, a 27-year-old Black man, was killed in New Orleans, Louisiana, on March 8, 2018, when a burst of gunfire turned an ordinary evening in the Dixon neighborhood into a crime scene. Just after 7 p.m., police were dispatched for an aggravated battery by shooting near the intersection of General Ogden and Marks Streets, outside a corner store. By the time officers arrived, they found Smith outside the store suffering from multiple gunshot wounds.
He was pronounced dead at the scene, and the call was upgraded from a shooting investigation to a homicide.
In the immediate aftermath, investigators began canvassing the area and collecting evidence, working to identify whoever pulled the trigger and why. Public information released that night emphasized that detectives were still piecing together the motive and the identities of the person or persons responsible. The case was treated as an active, developing homicide investigation, with police asking anyone who saw or heard anything near the store and the intersection around the time of the shooting to come forward.
As days moved on and grief settled in, Smith’s death was marked not only by the violent circumstances outside the store but also by the quieter details of who he was to the people who loved him. Published family notices identified him as the son of Terry Smith Ratcliff and John W. Coleman, Jr., and described a large circle of siblings, relatives, and friends left to carry the loss. Another obituary listing recorded his birth date as August 6, 1990, reflecting how quickly a life can be reduced to dates on a page when the end comes suddenly.
Publicly available law-enforcement updates tied to the initial homicide release do not name any suspect, describe an arrest, or announce charges or a prosecution stemming from the shooting. The official statement described investigators as still gathering evidence to identify the person or persons responsible, and it directed tips to a homicide detective and to Crimestoppers, underscoring that investigators were relying on the community for information that might break the case open.
