Anthony Jackson, a 35-year-old Black/African American man, was spending Sunday evening, October 12, 2025, watching football with friends on the patio at The Greatest, a neighborhood bar in the 13700 block of South Inglewood Avenue in Hawthorne. Around 7 p.m., gunfire erupted from a passing vehicle; a round struck Jackson in the head, and he was pronounced dead at the scene as Hawthorne police and Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Homicide detectives converged on the bar.
Investigators described the attack as a likely drive-by shooting and asked the public for leads while they worked to piece together what happened.
Authorities publicly identified the victim as Anthony Jackson after the county medical examiner confirmed his name and age. Early reports noted he had been seated outside, watching Sunday Night Football, when the shooter opened fire from the street. Witness accounts gathered in local coverage added a chilling wrinkle: a man believed to have been kicked out of the venue earlier following a dispute was suspected of returning to fire at the patio, even though Jackson was not involved in the earlier altercation.
Within days, prosecutors filed a murder case tied to the ambush. A 43-year-old Lawndale resident, Daniel Dennis, was charged with one count of murder in connection with the shooting outside The Greatest; court records reported he pleaded not guilty. The case moved forward even as detectives continued to sort through witness statements and surveillance footage to clarify motive and confirm whether anyone else might have been involved.
Jackson’s killing rattled Hawthorne, arriving just days before another fatal shooting elsewhere in the city that week. Candlelight tributes listed his name among recent victims of gun violence in Hawthorne, and community outlets tracked the investigation’s milestones as officials urged anyone with information to contact the Sheriff’s Homicide Bureau.
