Michael Long, a 32-year-old man from Quincy, was fatally shot in Tallahassee on the night of February 10, 2024. Shortly after 11 p.m., officers with the Tallahassee Police Department responded to the 2200 block of Parkbrook Court, a residential area near East Park Avenue. When they arrived, they found Long outside a home suffering from multiple gunshot wounds. He was pronounced dead at the scene.
Investigators soon connected the killing to a police pursuit that unfolded only minutes after the gunfire. Officers chased a vehicle through the Midtown area as it traveled along McDaniel Street, struck another moving vehicle and continued toward Williams Street. The fleeing car eventually crashed into trees near Lafayette Park, close to the tennis courts and a Boy Scouts building. Police believed that the vehicle and its armed driver were connected to Long's shooting. The driver abandoned the wrecked car and escaped before officers could take him into custody.
As detectives pieced together what happened, prosecutors alleged that four men had gone to the Parkbrook Court residence as part of a planned robbery. According to the prosecution, the group lured Long outside by falsely telling him that they had struck his vehicle. Once he emerged from the home to investigate, the men attempted to rob him. Long was then shot nine times and left dying outside the residence as those responsible fled.
The investigation eventually led authorities to Jordan Presley, Kadeem A. Phillips, Jvashni Desanges and Walter Hodge. Presley and Phillips were prosecuted together, while the cases involving the other accused participants proceeded separately. Desanges reportedly testified for the prosecution during the trial of Presley and Phillips, providing evidence about the group's actions and the circumstances that brought Long outside shortly before he was killed.
Following a three-day trial, a jury found Presley and Phillips guilty of first-degree murder. They were also convicted of firearm-related offenses described by prosecutors as possession of a firearm by a delinquent. Because Florida law requires a life sentence for first-degree murder under the circumstances of the case, both men were sentenced in February 2026 to mandatory life imprisonment.
The remaining proceedings involving Desanges and Hodge were not resolved at the time Presley and Phillips received their sentences. Reports indicated that both had been charged in connection with the killing, but their final convictions or sentences had not yet been publicly announced. Prosecutors also said that aspects of the broader investigation remained pending, leaving the ultimate legal outcome for every alleged participant unsettled even after two members of the group were sentenced to spend the rest of their lives in prison.
Long's death devastated his family in Quincy and Tallahassee. He was survived by his parents, Tracy Dasher-Williams and Jerry Long, as well as his children, Michaelah Long, Mahogani Long, Michael Long Jr. and Kadrien Jones. After the shooting, relatives described the enormous loss created by his absence and mourned the life and future taken from him. A viewing was held on February 23, followed by a celebration of life the next day at the Joe Ferolito Recreation Center in Quincy. What began as a late-night report of gunfire ultimately developed into a complex murder prosecution centered on an alleged robbery plot, a violent ambush, a fleeing vehicle and four accused participants.
