On the evening of October 16, 2016, a sequence of events unfolded in Dearborn, Michigan, that would culminate in the tragic death of 33-year-old Raymond Mshahwar. A male resident of Canton, he was last seen alive at approximately 9 p.m. at a bowling alley in Westland. An hour later, a distressing scene was discovered in the vicinity of Madison and Bennett streets in Dearborn. Police responded to a report of a vehicle that had crashed into several parked cars. Upon their arrival, they found Mshahwar inside the vehicle, not as the victim of a mere traffic accident, but as the victim of a fatal gunshot wound. He was transported to a local hospital where he was pronounced dead.
The investigation that followed what police described as an 'odd case' soon began to unravel the final hour of Mshahwar's life. It was determined that he had been lured to the location in Dearborn by individuals he had met online. The motive, as it would later be revealed, was robbery. The Dearborn Police Department, in partnership with Crime Stoppers, appealed to the public for any information that could help them piece together the timeline of that fateful hour. Their investigative efforts, which included reviewing surveillance footage from the area, were exhaustive.
These efforts led to a breakthrough in the case. On December 13, 2016, investigators arrested two individuals in connection with the homicide: 18-year-old Walbert Morales-Castro of Detroit and a 16-year-old juvenile female from Dearborn. The investigation continued, leading to a third arrest on January 27, 2017. Kayla Thomas, a 21-year-old resident of Taylor, was taken into custody. Thomas faced serious charges, including homicide-felony murder, conspiracy to commit armed robbery, and armed robbery. Both Morales-Castro and the juvenile female were also set to face court proceedings for their alleged involvement in the death of Raymond Mshahwar, a man remembered by his family's attorney as a son, a brother, and a father to a young boy.
