Sylvester Lee, a 41-year-old Black man from Clayton, Delaware, was fatally shot on the night of June 22, 2018, at the Liberty Court Apartments in Dover. At approximately 9:41 p.m., Dover Police Department officers were dispatched to the apartment complex at 1289 Walker Road after receiving reports that someone had been shot. When officers arrived, they found Lee lying on the ground with multiple gunshot wounds to his torso.
Emergency personnel rushed Lee to Bayhealth Kent General
Hospital in an effort to save his life. His wounds proved fatal, and he was pronounced dead at approximately 10:15 p.m., less than an hour after police were called to the scene. What had apparently begun as a confrontation between two men had ended with Lee mortally wounded outside the apartment complex.
As detectives reconstructed the events leading to the shooting, they identified Timothy Safford, then 42, as the suspected gunman. Investigators determined that Lee and Safford had become involved in a verbal argument shortly before the gunfire erupted. According to police, the two men were walking toward Lee's vehicle when Safford allegedly produced a firearm and shot him. Authorities did not publicly disclose what caused the argument or whether the confrontation had begun elsewhere before the men approached the vehicle.
Dover police announced on June 29, 2018, that Safford was wanted in connection with Lee's killing. A warrant charged him with first-degree murder, possession of a firearm during the commission of a felony, and two counts of possession of a firearm or ammunition by a person prohibited. Police warned that he should be considered armed and dangerous and sought assistance locating him, noting that his last known Dover address was no longer believed to be current.
The search extended beyond Delaware and eventually involved the United States Marshals Service Fugitive Task Force. On July 30, 2018, task force members located Safford in the 300 block of Van Buren Street NW in Washington, D.C. He was arrested without incident and held while arrangements were made to return him to Delaware.
On August 24, 2018, Dover police took custody of Safford following his extradition. He was formally charged with first-degree murder and the related firearms offenses and was committed to the James T. Vaughn Correctional Center in default of $1,070,000 cash bail. Publicly available police and news reports document his arrest, extradition and formal charges, but accessible sources do not clearly establish the ultimate result of the prosecution, including whether the case proceeded to trial, ended in a plea agreement or resulted in a conviction and sentence.
