LaMarch Russell, Jr., a 21-year-old Black male from Montgomery, Alabama, was killed on July 10, 2023, in a shooting that left two young men dead on Hugh Street. That night, around 8 p.m., Montgomery police and fire medics were called to the 1200 block of Hugh Street, where they found Russell and 25-year-old Melvin Steiner, Jr. suffering from fatal gunshot wounds. Both were pronounced dead at the scene.
The violence appears to have unfolded suddenly in a residential part of the city, turning an ordinary summer evening into one marked by shock, grief, and a crime scene that left investigators working to piece together what had happened.
In the days that followed, police publicly identified Russell as one of the victims, but the circumstances behind the shooting remained unclear. What did emerge from memorial and obituary information was the outline of a young life that had been rooted in Montgomery. Russell, also remembered by the nickname “Syrup,” was described as a native and resident of the city. His obituary placed his birth on August 20, 2001, and showed just how many people were left carrying the weight of his loss, including his parents, siblings, grandparents, and his young son. Those details give the case a human shape beyond the police reports: this was not only a homicide investigation, but the sudden end of a young man whose family had expected many more years with him.
As investigators pushed forward, an arrest did come in connection with the double shooting, but not fully for Russell’s death. On July 27, 2023, Montgomery police announced that 22-year-old Kendarious Young had been arrested and charged with murder in the killing of Melvin Steiner, Jr. Police said Young was taken into custody by the U.S. Marshals Service and booked into the Montgomery County Detention Facility without bond. Public reporting tied that arrest directly to Steiner’s death and noted that Steiner and Russell had been shot in the same Hugh Street incident.
What makes Russell’s case especially painful is that the publicly available reporting does not show the same level of closure for him. At the time police announced Young’s arrest, authorities said Russell’s death was still under investigation. In the online sources available, there does not appear to be a separate public announcement of an arrest, additional suspect charge, trial, or conviction specifically for the killing of LaMarch Russell, Jr. So the story that remains is one of a young man killed in the same burst of gunfire that led to a murder charge in the death beside him, while his own case, at least in the public record that can be found online, appears to have remained unresolved.
