On the night of July 27, 2025, 21-year-old Xavier Trayshawn Garland, a Black/African American male, was shot and killed in a burst of gunfire on the 500 block of Lane Street in Elizabeth City, North Carolina. Officers arrived just after 10 p.m. to a street strewn with shell casings and three people down; Xavier Trayshawn Garland, age 21, was pronounced dead at the scene while two others were rushed away for emergency care.
In the earliest hours of the inquiry, investigators said the violence appeared isolated, even as neighbors absorbed the shock of a killing on a summer Sunday night.
The days that followed drew city leaders and police before cameras, asking residents for patience and help. Interim Chief Eddie Graham spoke of “making it uncomfortable” for those who choose violence, an edge in his voice that matched the frustration in the room. Police repeated that the shooting was under active investigation; one wounded victim was 21, the other 19, both taken to Sentara Norfolk General Hospital. Local coverage traced the timeline—roughly 10:04 p.m., a flurry of shots, then blue lights and tape—and recorded the community’s debate over patrols, curfews, and a plan to reopen a neighborhood substation.
As detectives worked the case, momentum shifted. By late August, Elizabeth City police said they had secured warrants for 19-year-old Kashaun Jalek Stokley in connection with the July 27 triple shooting that took the life of Xavier Trayshawn Garland, age 21. Within days, officers announced that Kashaun Jalek Stokley had been taken into custody. He was charged with murder, robbery with a dangerous weapon, and assault with a deadly weapon with intent to kill inflicting serious injury, and was booked into the Albemarle District Jail without bond. News reports placed his last known address in the 300 block of Cypress Street.
Even as the legal process began, public tributes fixed the date and place of the loss. Memorial pages noted that Xavier Trayshawn Garland, age 21, “entered into eternal rest” on July 27, 2025, in Elizabeth City, and listed a celebration of life that mid-August under the care of Horton’s Funeral Home and Cremations. The quiet facts of a service notice—names of parents and siblings, a time and a chapel—stood alongside the stark entry in a national gun-violence ledger that marked the date, the city, and the age of the victim.
