In the small city of Greensboro, Alabama, the afternoon of March 5, 2021, was shattered by gunfire that ended the life of 20-year-old Javion McGuffie. A Black male, McGuffie was fatally shot around 2 p.m. in what authorities believe was a gang-related incident. The young man's death set off a chain of events that would see more violence and multiple arrests, highlighting underlying tensions within the community.
The suspect in McGuffie's death was identified as 16-year-old Chardarius Moore. Moore was not a stranger to law enforcement, having been released from a juvenile facility just weeks prior for his alleged involvement in another shooting that occurred in Greensboro the previous fall. He was also a suspect in a separate shooting in Perry County. Following the shooting of McGuffie, it is alleged that Moore was driven from the scene by his uncle, Calvin Maiden Jr., in a getaway car that was later discovered in the nearby town of Uniontown.
The tragedy deepened approximately two hours after Javion McGuffie was killed. In an apparent act of retaliation, McGuffie's brother, Jmar McGuffie, reportedly went to the residence of the suspected shooter, Chardarius Moore, and opened fire. In the process, Moore's 89-year-old grandmother was struck by a bullet, sustaining a non-life-threatening graze wound to the buttocks for which she received hospital treatment.
In the aftermath of the two shootings, both Chardarius Moore and Jmar McGuffie were taken into custody. The Alabama State Bureau of Investigation took the lead on the homicide case of Javion McGuffie, while the Greensboro Police Department handled the investigation into the subsequent shooting of Moore's grandmother.
