Black / African American, Male, Brandon Michael Merritt, age 19, had returned to Anchorage earlier in May 2016 after time in Ewa Beach, Hawaii, where he had graduated high school. Born March 30, 1997, in San Antonio, Texas, he had lived in Alaska since childhood before moving to Hawaii in 2012. On the evening of May 25, 2016, just before 9 p.m., he was at the Holiday gas station on the 1500 block of Abbott Road in South Anchorage, seated in the front of a car with friends.
Within minutes, a chance encounter at the pumps would end his life.
According to Anchorage police, another customer at the pumps, 23-year-old Andrew Robertson-Goughnour, and the 19-year-old victim exchanged words as the car with the teen prepared to leave. Witnesses told investigators that the 19-year-old stepped out of the vehicle and moved toward Robertson-Goughnour, who was openly carrying a. 45-caliber semi-automatic pistol in a hip holster. Robertson-Goughnour drew the weapon and fired once, striking the 19-year-old near the pumps. Officers and medics arrived to find him dead at the scene; police noted there were no outstanding suspects. Robertson-Goughnour remained on site and was taken into custody for questioning.
By the following day, May 26, 2016, Robertson-Goughnour was under arrest and charged with first- and second-degree murder in the death of the 19-year-old. Early reports emphasized that the two men were strangers and that the confrontation began as a verbal dispute in the gas-station lot. The arrest and charging documents marked the case as a homicide investigation from the outset.
Years later, the criminal case concluded with a plea and sentence. In November 2023, Robertson-Goughnour pleaded guilty to aggravated manslaughter for the killing of the 19-year-old and was sentenced to 20 years with 11½ years suspended—just over eight years to serve—followed by five years of probation. As part of the sentence, he is prohibited from possessing firearms for life. The resolution replaced the original murder counts and formally closed the question of the shooter's identity and legal culpability in the death at the Abbott Road Holiday station.
In the days after the shooting, obituary notices and memorial pages remembered the 19-year-old as a recent graduate who loved Alaska enough to return that spring. They traced a life that moved from Texas to Alaska to Hawaii and back again, ending in a sudden moment beneath the gas-station lights on an ordinary Wednesday in Anchorage.
