Jarmar D. Richardson, an 18-year-old Black male from Dover, was fatally shot on the night of September 12, 2019, in the Village at McKee Branch community. At approximately 10:32 p.m., Dover police officers were dispatched to the 200 block of Harmony Lane after reports of gunfire echoed through the residential neighborhood. When officers arrived, they found Richardson suffering from multiple gunshot wounds to his upper body.
Emergency personnel rushed Richardson from the scene to
Bayhealth Kent General Hospital in Dover. Despite efforts to save him, he later died from his injuries. His death turned the late-night shooting investigation into a homicide case, and detectives began examining the circumstances surrounding the attack, searching for witnesses and gathering evidence from the area where he had been found.
Investigators soon identified 21-year-old Dover resident Stefan E. Rush-Wilson as a suspect. Police did not publicly disclose what led them to focus on Rush-Wilson, what relationship may have existed between him and Richardson, or what motive they believed was behind the shooting. Authorities reported only that he was developed as a suspect a short time after the killing.
Eleven days after Richardson's death, Rush-Wilson turned himself in to the Dover Police Department on the afternoon of September 23. He was charged with first-degree murder and possession of a firearm during the commission of a felony. Following his arrest, he was committed to Sussex Correctional Institution after failing to post a $110,000 cash bond.
The case later moved into Kent County Superior Court, where a grand jury indicted Rush-Wilson on a count of first-degree murder in connection with Richardson's death. The indictment formally advanced the prosecution beyond the initial arrest and charging stage. Publicly accessible reports reviewed for the case do not clearly document a completed trial, guilty plea, acquittal, conviction, dismissal, or final sentence, so the ultimate judicial outcome cannot be confirmed from those reports.
Richardson's family held funeral services on September 22, one day before the accused surrendered to police. His death left relatives and friends mourning a life that ended only months after his eighteenth birthday, while the criminal investigation resulted in the arrest and indictment of the man police believed was responsible.
