On a Thursday morning in Colorado Springs, the area outside the El Paso County courthouse became the scene of a fatal shooting. The victim was identified as 28-year-old William Winters, a male resident of the city. On November 16, 2023, just after 10 a.m., Winters was shot and killed near the courthouse on Tejon Street.
The man arrested in connection with the shooting is 29-year-old Shaquille Brown, also from Colorado Springs.
He was taken into custody at the scene by court security personnel and has since been charged with first-degree murder. The incident was not a random act of violence; it was the culmination of a history of conflict between the two men. Months prior, in April of the same year, Brown had reported being assaulted by Winters at a downtown bar called Blondies, an incident that reportedly left Brown requiring surgery.
On the day of the shooting, both men were ironically scheduled to be at the courthouse for proceedings related to the earlier assault case. Brown told investigators that he had been receiving threats from Winters via text and Facebook and that he had acquired a handgun out of fear. He claimed that on the morning of the shooting, he saw Winters approaching him outside the courthouse and, fearing for his life, he drew his weapon and fired. According to Brown's account, he only intended to stop a perceived threat and did not continue to shoot after Winters was on the ground.
However, surveillance footage from the courthouse painted a starkly different picture of the events. The video reportedly showed Brown approaching Winters, who was carrying a baby in a car seat, and opening fire. After Winters fell to the ground, dropping the car seat, the footage allegedly shows Brown standing over him and firing several more times. When confronted with this discrepancy, Brown claimed to have 'blacked out' and not been in control of his actions. An autopsy would later reveal that Winters had sustained multiple gunshot wounds, including to the chest and head. The baby in the car seat suffered minor injuries consistent with the short fall. Brown is also facing charges of child abuse and possession of a weapon by a previous offender. He is currently being held on a $1 million bond.
