Phillip Maurice Chapman, a 38-year-old Black/African American man from Wilmington, Delaware, was killed during the early morning hours of August 31, 2018, one day before his 39th birthday. Known to relatives and friends as “Head Ball,” Chapman had grown up in Wilmington and worked for years in construction. He was the father of nine children and was remembered as someone who took pride in talking about them.
He was also known for his cooking, especially the family and neighborhood barbecues he organized, as well as his basketball ability and his protective devotion to relatives and friends.
At approximately 1:00 a.m., Wilmington police were sent to the 200 block of North Van Buren Street after receiving a report of gunfire. When officers arrived in the Hilltop neighborhood, they found Chapman lying in the street in the 1100 block of North Conrad Street. He had suffered multiple gunshot wounds and was pronounced dead at the scene. The circumstances described by police indicated that the shooting occurred near North Van Buren Street before Chapman was discovered on Conrad Street. The investigation was assigned to Detective Sergeant Thomas Curley of the Wilmington Police Department's Criminal Investigations Division.
The case remained under investigation for more than a year before authorities publicly announced a suspect. Detective Curley's investigation identified Qymere Maddrey, who was 28 at the time of the announcement, as the person suspected of killing Chapman. Prosecutors presented the evidence to a New Castle County grand jury, which returned an indictment on December 9, 2019. Maddrey was charged with first-degree murder, possession of a firearm during the commission of a felony and possession of a firearm by a person prohibited.
Maddrey was already incarcerated on unrelated charges when the homicide indictment was issued, so police did not have to locate him in the community. He was arraigned on the new charges on December 11, 2019, in Justice of the Peace Court 20. The court set his bail at $700,000 cash only, and he remained in custody on both the Chapman case and the unrelated matters. Wilmington Police Chief Robert Tracy credited investigators with continuing to work the case until they were able to identify a suspect and bring the evidence before the grand jury.
The prosecution ultimately resulted in Maddrey being held criminally responsible for Chapman's death. In March 2022, a Delaware court sentenced him to 23 years in prison for the August 2018 killing. The sentence brought the legal proceedings to a close nearly four years after Chapman was found mortally wounded on Conrad Street, leaving his children, relatives and friends to remember a Wilmington father whose life had revolved around family, cooking, community gatherings and the people he tried to protect.
