Dale Matson, a 48-year-old White man, was found dead in the early morning hours of October 7, 2024, after deputies were called to the 3000 block of Albright Road in Hanover Township near Newark, Ohio. Authorities said they arrived around 3:12 to 3:15 a.m. on a report of a shooting and discovered Matson dead at the scene inside a vehicle. Court and news reports later described multiple gunshot wounds, shell casings scattered around the car, and a bullet hole in the driver’s side door, details
that turned the scene into something far more chilling than a sudden death call. Investigators quickly determined the killing was not random, and the case moved almost immediately from an unexplained death into a targeted homicide investigation. Matson’s obituary painted a very different side of him from the violence of that night, remembering him as an artist who loved drawing portraits, painting canvases, motorcycles, tattooing, and music.
Within days, investigators announced arrests, naming four suspects: Jason Castle, Travis Schwarz, Brandy Sunkle, and Sasha Martin. Early reporting said all four were initially taken into custody in connection with the homicide, with authorities alleging the events were set in motion after messages were sent asking others to come to the property where Matson was present. Prosecutors later said deleted texts and Facebook messages on Sunkle’s phone suggested she told others that Matson was hitting her and behaving erratically, and that she planned to keep him there until the others arrived. According to later court reporting, investigators alleged that after the group arrived, Schwarz used a wooden stick to tap on Matson’s truck before Castle opened fire. Martin was accused not of participating in the shooting itself, but of helping dispose of Schwarz’s phone afterward by placing it in a Walmart trade-in box. The picture that emerged was of a confrontation that built in stages, with prosecutors arguing that it ended in a deliberate, coordinated attack rather than a chance encounter gone wrong.
The criminal case evolved significantly after the first round of indictments. Initial charges included murder and felonious assault counts for Castle, Schwarz, and Sunkle, while Martin was charged with tampering with evidence. All four originally pleaded not guilty in late October 2024. As the case moved forward, Jason Castle later pleaded guilty in 2025 in connection with Matson’s killing; one report said he pleaded guilty to murder before later trying to withdraw that plea, while later reporting said he ultimately pleaded guilty to involuntary manslaughter, weapons under disability, and aggravated possession of drugs, receiving an 18-year prison sentence. Brandy Sunkle also reached a plea agreement in 2025: her murder charge was reduced to involuntary manslaughter, and she pleaded guilty to that offense along with tampering with evidence and weapons under disability. She was sentenced to six years in prison, and Ohio prison records show her incarcerated on those convictions. Publicly available reporting located during this search did not establish a final conviction outcome for Travis Schwarz, and Martin was still reported as facing the tampering case as proceedings unfolded. In the end, the case against those accused did not rest on the idea of a mystery killer in the dark, but on investigators tracing relationships, messages, and actions after the gunfire, assembling a narrative in which Matson’s final hours were surrounded by people prosecutors believed were already moving toward violence.
