Do you know who murdered Patricia Ann Phelps? She was a 48-year-old female, walking along West 36th Avenue near Oregon Drive in Anchorage on the evening of August 9, 2017, when panic rippled down the block. At 8:58 p.m., gunfire erupted at the intersection, a Toyota 4Runner lurched away, plowed through a fence, and struck her. She died there, the autopsy later finding blunt force trauma from the vehicle rather than a gunshot wound.
Investigators quickly concluded she had not been part of the dispute and was unintentionally struck—another life caught in the wake of a violent moment that police said was tied to drugs rather than random chance.
Detectives pursued a “person of interest” seen leaving on a motorcycle and a witness who had been walking with the victim. Years went by as the case moved into the Anchorage Police Department's Cold Case Unit, evidence and tips layering into a picture of those violent minutes. Then, in late May 2021, an Anchorage grand jury indicted two men: Darin Lee Jones and Shawn Michael Phillips. The charges described a chaotic chain reaction—gunfire into a parked vehicle, a driver flooring the accelerator, a crash through a fence, and the 48-year-old woman struck and killed as she walked.
According to prosecutors' bail memorandum, Jones arrived at Phillips's garage in Spenard on August 9 and, after receiving a gun and leaving on a motorcycle, confronted people in a dark Toyota 4Runner on 36th Avenue while seeking a man known as “Tundra.” When Jones began firing into the vehicle, its driver sped off—the moment that led to the collision that killed the 48-year-old woman. Investigators later recovered a firearm that a ballistics expert matched to shell casings at the scene, and surveillance video appeared to show Jones attempting to hand off a gun shortly after the shooting. Prosecutors said the 48-year-old woman was not the intended target; the facts, they argued, fit Alaska's “transferred intent” murder theory.
The indictment charged Jones with first-degree murder, multiple counts of second-degree murder, attempted first-degree murder, manslaughter, robbery, assault, and weapons misconduct; Phillips faced second-degree murder, manslaughter, robbery, assault, and weapons misconduct counts. Both men were taken into custody, with initial cash bail set at $1,000,000 for Jones and $500,000 for Phillips, and scheduled for arraignments in early June 2021. Authorities emphasized that the charges were allegations and that both defendants were presumed innocent as the case proceeded.
