In the early morning hours of July 27, 2019, Dathan Gray, a 32-year-old Black/African American male, was shot and killed in Bridgeport, Connecticut. The incident occurred around 1:15 a.m. near the intersection of Newfield Avenue and Revere Street on the city's East End. Gray was found lying in the street with multiple gunshot wounds. He was transported to Bridgeport Hospital, where he was pronounced dead.
An autopsy later revealed he had been shot 16 times, with three of those wounds to his head.
The investigation into the death of the man, a father of three, soon focused on his ex-wife, Larise King. The night of the murder, just hours before the shooting, King and Gray had been involved in a heated, physical altercation at a restaurant. Witnesses reported that King had threatened Gray during the argument. Prosecutors laid out a narrative in which King, following the fight, solicited her cousin and another man to murder her ex-husband. She allegedly drove the two men, who wore hooded sweatshirts to hide their identities, to the location where Gray was.
According to the prosecution, King waited in a white SUV a block away while the two men approached Gray and opened fire. Surveillance footage and cell phone records placed her near the scene of the crime, despite her claims to police that she was at home. After the shooting, the two men returned to the vehicle, and King allegedly drove them away from the scene. In September 2019, she was arrested and charged with conspiracy to commit murder.
Larise King's case was the first criminal trial to take place in Connecticut after the COVID-19 pandemic shutdown. Opting for a trial by a three-judge panel instead of a jury, she was found guilty in May 2021 of conspiracy to commit murder and accessory to murder. The verdict was a 2-1 decision, and she was subsequently sentenced to 50 years in prison. However, her conviction was later overturned by the state Supreme Court, which ruled that she had not been properly informed that a conviction by the panel did not require a unanimous vote. In June 2025, to avoid another trial, King pleaded guilty to a lesser charge of accessory to first-degree manslaughter with a firearm. She was then sentenced to 20 years in prison followed by 10 years of special parole. The two men who authorities believe actually shot Dathan Gray have never been identified or arrested.
