Rodney Starks, a 31-year-old man from Memphis, Tennessee, was spending the early afternoon of May 3, 2017, in the city’s Medical District when the violence that would end his life unfolded. Around 2:40 p.m., Memphis police were called to the area of North Waldran and Merriwether, in the 200 block of Waldran, after reports of gunfire. Officers arrived to find a man lying in the street suffering from a gunshot wound.
He was rushed to Regional One Hospital, the trauma center that serves much of the city, but despite efforts to save him, he was pronounced dead there a short time later.
The address where Rodney fell, near 237 North Waldran, sits in a dense strip of apartments and medical facilities just off the heart of the Medical District. In the immediate aftermath, detectives taped off the street, interviewed residents, and tried to piece together how a routine weekday afternoon had turned into a homicide scene. Friends and family would later remember him by his nickname “Pooh Bear,” describe him as wise and very outgoing, and recall that he didn’t mind helping others. Online memorials note that he was a father and a former student of Westside High School, details that paint a picture of a young man whose life was rooted in Memphis and in his relationships. Candles, messages pleading to “stop the violence,” and posts from grieving loved ones show how deeply his death shook the people who knew him.
As investigators worked the case, the Memphis Police Department took the unusual step of publicly identifying a young man they believed might hold answers. In a homicide bulletin, police said they had received information that 19-year-old Warren Manns might have information about Rodney’s killing. They described him as a person of interest, not as a formally charged suspect, and emphasized that he could be driving a black 2000 Nissan Maxima with Tennessee tags 9C16U0. That car was listed as a verified stolen vehicle, and Manns already had an outstanding warrant for theft of property between $1,000 and $2,500. The department released his name and vehicle description in hopes that someone in the community would recognize him or the car and call in a tip, linking the search for Rodney’s killer with an ongoing hunt for a young man already wanted on another charge.
Despite that early lead, there is no public record that anyone was ever arrested or charged specifically for Rodney Starks’ murder. The person of interest named by police was sought for questioning and associated with a stolen vehicle and an existing theft warrant, but available news reports and official statements do not show that those threads ever resulted in homicide charges in Rodney’s case. Years later, his name still appears on online gun violence memorials, where family members continue to post tributes and messages of grief. The candles lit in his memory, and the words from relatives who write about feeling incomplete without him, suggest that for those closest to him, the lack of a clear resolution in the courts has left a wound that has never fully closed.
