In the late morning hours of a crisp autumn Sunday in Minneapolis, tragedy struck an alleyway, leaving a family to grapple with a sudden and violent loss. Darren Pernell Watkins, a 54-year-old Black male from LaPlace, Louisiana, was found shot multiple times on October 28, 2018. The Hennepin County Medical Examiner's Office would later confirm that he sustained gunshot wounds to his chest and arm, ruling his death a homicide.
In the immediate aftermath, Minneapolis police descended on the scene in the 5200 block of James Avenue North, collecting evidence and searching for answers, but no arrests were initially made.
The investigation into the death of Darren Watkins soon pointed detectives toward a suspect, a 27-year-old man named Tyree Johnson. A crucial piece of evidence was a black Volkswagen Passat with distinctive missing trim, which witnesses reported seeing flee the alley shortly after the gunshots rang out. This same vehicle had been linked to another shooting that occurred just a day prior. Further investigation uncovered that an automatic lock/unlock button from a vehicle door panel was found at the scene of Watkins' death, and the passenger door of the Passat Johnson was later found in was missing a similar button. Ballistics testing also connected the 9mm shell casings found in the alley to the weapon used in two other recent shootings in the area.
In February of 2019, while already in custody for a separate incident, Tyree Johnson was charged with the second-degree murder of Darren Pernell Watkins. Prosecutors built a case around the evidence of the distinctive vehicle, the recovered car part, and the ballistics match. They also utilized cellphone data which placed Johnson in the vicinity of the murder at the time it occurred. Despite the evidence presented by the prosecution, the legal proceedings that followed did not result in a conviction. In July 2019, a jury acquitted Tyree Johnson of the murder of Darren Watkins, leaving the case without a conclusive resolution and his loved ones still seeking justice.
