Zahviaire Berry-Shivers was an 18-year-old Black male whose life ended in a burst of gunfire on January 26, 2018, in Wilmington, Delaware. At approximately 4:30 that Friday afternoon, Wilmington police officers were called to Wilmington Hospital after a gravely wounded shooting victim was brought there in a private vehicle and left at the ambulance entrance.
Berry-Shivers had suffered multiple gunshot wounds to his torso and was rushed into surgery, but medical personnel were unable to save him. He was pronounced dead at approximately 4:59 p.m., less than half an hour after arriving at the hospital.
Investigators determined that the violence had unfolded in the 2300 block of North Pine Street. Authorities later said Berry-Shivers had been running along Pine Street while another young man pursued him and repeatedly fired a gun. The chase continued as shots were discharged, leaving Berry-Shivers mortally wounded. His death became Wilmington's first reported homicide of 2018 and occurred amid several shootings in the city during the opening weeks of the year.
The shooting also caused a tense disruption at Wilmington Hospital. As Berry-Shivers was being treated, a disturbance involving people who were reportedly distraught over what had happened prompted authorities to temporarily close the hospital because of police activity. Ambulance crews throughout New Castle County were instructed to avoid the facility and take patients elsewhere. A substantial police presence gathered near the emergency department before the hospital reopened roughly ten minutes later.
For months, the investigation continued without an arrest. Detectives eventually identified Wilmington resident Andre Fletcher-Hargrow as the person suspected of pursuing Berry-Shivers and firing the fatal shots. On June 6, 2018, the Delaware Department of Justice authorized a warrant charging Fletcher-Hargrow with first-degree murder and possession of a firearm during the commission of a felony.
Fletcher-Hargrow was not immediately taken into custody in Delaware. Members of the U.S. Marshals Service First State Fugitive Task Force located and apprehended him in Upper Darby, Pennsylvania, on June 13, approximately six months after the killing. He was subsequently returned to Wilmington and delivered to police headquarters on June 22 to be arraigned on the homicide and firearm charges.
The prosecution ultimately ended with a guilty plea rather than a murder trial. In October 2019, Fletcher-Hargrow pleaded guilty to second-degree murder, accepting criminal responsibility for chasing Berry-Shivers down Pine Street and shooting repeatedly as the two ran. The plea resolved the question of who would be held legally accountable for the killing, although publicly available reports reviewed for the case stated only that sentencing was scheduled to occur before a Delaware Superior Court judge in January and did not clearly establish the final prison term imposed.
Berry-Shivers was born on July 9, 1999, and his death came only months before what would have been his nineteenth birthday. His loved ones gathered for services at Congo Funeral Home in Wilmington in early February 2018, followed by a private burial. What began as an unexplained shooting and a desperate arrival at a hospital eventually became a solved homicide through the work of Wilmington investigators, Delaware prosecutors and federal fugitive officers, culminating in the arrest and second-degree murder conviction of Fletcher-Hargrow.
