In the late summer of 2024, a dispute during a dice game in Abbeville, Louisiana, turned fatal, ending the life of 20-year-old Jarrian Jaquan Bernard. The male victim was at the Herod Village Apartments on Martin Luther King Drive on the evening of Monday, August 26, 2024, when the gathering was shattered by gunfire.
According to reports from law enforcement, a large group had assembled under a pavilion at the apartment complex to shoot dice.
An altercation broke out, leading one of the players to brandish an illegally modified automatic weapon. He fired multiple shots into the crowd, striking two people.
In the immediate aftermath of the shooting, chaos ensued as people fled the scene. A vehicle with its emergency flashers activated was pursued by officers responding to the call, only for them to discover the driver was rushing one of the victims to a nearby hospital. Jarrian Bernard sustained three gunshot wounds, one to his left shoulder, another to his right shoulder, and one to his right wrist. Despite efforts to save him, he succumbed to his injuries. A second individual, identified as 26-year-old John'Trell Rice, was also wounded in the incident. He suffered two gunshot wounds, one to the center of his chest and another to his left shoulder, and was transported to a hospital for treatment.
For months, the alleged shooter remained at large. However, on Tuesday, April 8, 2025, over six months after the deadly shooting, authorities apprehended the suspect. D'Jacqney 'Poppy' Mitchell, 21 years old, was taken into custody by the St. Landry Parish Sheriff's Office based on outstanding warrants. He was subsequently transferred to the Abbeville Police Department. Mitchell was booked on charges of first-degree murder for the death of Jarrian Bernard and attempted first-degree murder for the shooting of John'Trell Rice. His bond was set at $750,000, and he was to be sent to the Vermilion Parish jail.
