In the late hours of a spring Tuesday in Topeka, Kansas, the life of Mark Edwards, a 37-year-old Black / African American man, was tragically cut short. On April 28, 2020, at approximately 11:25 p.m., the Shawnee County Emergency Communications Center received reports of gunfire in the 1400 block of S.E. 14th Street. Officers arrived to find Mark Edwards with life-threatening injuries from which he would not recover; he was pronounced dead at the scene.
This incident marked the sixth homicide in the city for that year.
The investigation into Edwards' death took a significant turn the following morning. Around 9:30 a.m., authorities received a call about a deceased person in the 1300 block of SE Locust Street, near the location of the previous night's shooting. The deceased individual was identified as 36-year-old Zennie L. Vasser Jr. Investigators quickly determined that the two deaths were connected and stemmed from the same altercation.
According to the preliminary investigation, Zennie L. Vasser Jr. was identified as the individual who shot Mark Edwards. In a turn of events, a witness to this initial shooting is believed to have then fired at Vasser in self-defense, resulting in his death. Law enforcement officials stated that they considered it an isolated incident and were not searching for any other suspects in connection with the case. The community was left to mourn the loss of Mark Edwards, a father and brother, as the details of that fatal night came to light.
