On the afternoon of December 1, 2022, 44-year-old Black/African American male Lerrie Kintua Tate was caught in a sudden act of violence in Wilmington, Delaware. Police were called to the 1000 block of North Madison Street around 2:10 to 2:11 p.m. after reports of a shooting. When officers arrived, they found Tate suffering from gunshot wounds. He was taken to a hospital, but he did not survive.
The investigation later placed the shooting inside a first-floor apartment at 1007 North
Madison Street. Court records say officers found Tate on the floor of a bedroom with a gunshot wound and recovered a nine-millimeter shell casing in the same room. A witness told police they saw the shooter, who was wearing a black ski mask and a black sweatshirt with writing on it, and believed the person responsible lived on the second floor of the same apartment building.
Police searched the area and found a black mask and a black sweatshirt with yellow and green writing on the sidewalk around the corner in the 700 block of West 10th Street. Surveillance footage became a key part of the case. Investigators said video showed a person wearing clothing matching the witness description running out of the apartment building, going south on North Madison Street, and turning toward the block where the mask and sweatshirt were later recovered. Other footage reportedly showed the same person arriving in a red Lexus before the shooting and walking toward the building.
For months, the case remained under investigation. Wilmington Police Detective Justin Kane handled the investigation, and the recovered clothing was submitted for DNA testing. According to court records, the mask was sent out in late December 2022, and the DNA results came back in June 2023, preliminarily linking the mask to Dayquane Barnes. Investigators also worked to confirm whether Barnes still lived in the second-floor apartment and whether he was connected to the red Lexus seen in surveillance footage.
On August 8, 2023, police arrested 31-year-old Dayquane Barnes during a motor vehicle stop in the same area where the shooting had happened. He was taken into custody without incident. Authorities charged him with First Degree Murder, First Degree Home Invasion Burglary, two counts of Possession of a Firearm During the Commission of a Felony, and other related charges. Court records later show that the indictment also included Reckless Endangering First Degree, Wearing a Disguise During the Commission of a Felony, and two counts of Possession of a Firearm by a Person Prohibited. Barnes was arraigned and held at the Howard R. Young Correctional Institution on $4,000,000 cash-only bail.
Barnes later challenged evidence seized from his apartment, arguing that the search warrant was based on stale information because months had passed between the shooting and the warrant. Prosecutors argued that police waited for DNA results and then worked to confirm Barnes’ connection to the apartment and vehicle. In January 2025, a Delaware Superior Court judge denied Barnes’ motion to suppress, allowing the challenged evidence to remain available to the prosecution. Publicly available sources reviewed did not show a final trial verdict or conviction, and police had not publicly provided a motive for Tate’s killing.
