In the early evening of November 29, 2021, a grim discovery was made at a Public Storage facility on Parkside Avenue in Ewing Township, a community bordering Trenton, New Jersey. There, outside one of the storage units, lay the body of 29-year-old Cedric Hennessee Flippin. Authorities were called to the scene at approximately 7:30 p.m., where they found the young man unresponsive. He had sustained gunshot wounds to his head and neck and was pronounced dead at the scene.
A single shell casing found nearby was a stark clue in the burgeoning homicide investigation.
The investigation into the death of the Trenton resident was swiftly undertaken by the Mercer County Homicide Task Force and the Ewing Police Department. Their efforts quickly led them to identify a suspect in the fatal shooting. Just a few days later, on December 2, 2021, the investigation culminated in a dramatic arrest at Newark Liberty International Airport. Members of the U.S. Marshals Service apprehended 30-year-old Daryl K. Smith as he was on an airplane preparing to depart for North Carolina.
Smith, also a resident of Trenton, was subsequently charged with first-degree murder in connection with Flippin's death. Additional charges against him included second-degree possession of a weapon for an unlawful purpose, two counts of unlawful possession of a weapon, and second-degree certain persons not to possess a firearm. Following his arrest, the prosecutor's office filed a motion to detain Smith pending his trial. Reports that emerged after the arrest revealed a prior connection between the victim and the accused; both men had been arrested together in 2019 at the Jackson Premium Outlets.
