Dashawn Ellison, 23, a Black/African American man, was spending the evening of February 7, 2019, inside an apartment in the Buena Vista area of North Nashville when a dice game was underway and, according to investigators, the night suddenly turned violent. Not long after 9:30 p.m., officers were dispatched to the 1500 block of 9th Avenue North as reports of gunfire drew them in. When police arrived, Ellison had been shot in the torso, and the scramble to save him began immediately.
He was rushed to Vanderbilt University Medical Center, but the wound proved fatal, and he was pronounced dead shortly after he arrived. Early accounts described investigators working to pin down exactly where the shooting happened and who pulled the trigger, with detectives gathering evidence and chasing leads from the people who had been there when the game turned deadly.
As the case unfolded beyond those first chaotic hours, police attention fixed on James C. Jones. By August 2020, local reporting tied Jones to Ellison’s killing and described him as a wanted suspect, even as he was also being sought in connection with another 2019 homicide investigation in Nashville. For years, he remained on the run, his name lingering in the background of the unsolved questions left behind by that February night on 9th Avenue North.
Nearly six years after Ellison’s death, Jones was taken into custody in December 2025 after a separate shooting at a Christmas party on West Trinity Lane. Investigators said Jones got into a physical altercation and then fired a single shot into a small group of people, striking a 26-year-old man in the leg; witnesses reportedly restrained Jones until officers arrived. After the arrest, authorities said Jones was booked on outstanding indictments that included first-degree murder, especially aggravated robbery, aggravated assault, and vehicle theft, and he also faced an aggravated-assault charge tied to the party shooting. Reporting at the time said Jones had been indicted in connection with Ellison’s fatal shooting during the dice game inside the 9th Avenue North apartment.
