In the early evening hours of a warm August day in Burlington, New Jersey, the life of 24-year-old Byron Turner was tragically cut short. On August 20, 2016, just before 7 p.m., gunfire erupted outside of Turner's home on the 100 block of East Federal Street. When police arrived, they found Turner suffering from a gunshot wound to the head. He was rushed to Cooper University Hospital in Camden, where he succumbed to his injuries three hours later.
The shooting shattered the peace of the
neighborhood, where children were playing nearby. In the chaos that ensued as people fled the gunfire, a five-year-old girl was injured. Though not struck by a bullet, she was taken to a local hospital for treatment of non-life-threatening injuries and was later released. Family members reported that the young girl and Turner were cousins.
Within a day of the shooting, authorities identified 26-year-old Samuel James of Burlington Township as the suspect and issued a warrant for his arrest on charges of murder. Described as armed and dangerous, James was known to frequent both Burlington and Camden. The manhunt concluded two days after the shooting, on August 22, 2016, when members of the Burlington County Sheriff's Department Warrant Unit and the U.S. Marshals Service New York/New Jersey Regional Fugitive Task Force apprehended him at an acquaintance's home in Barrington.
In June of the following year, a grand jury indicted Samuel James on charges of first-degree murder and two counts of second-degree weapons offenses. By September 2017, James had pleaded guilty to the murder charge. During his court proceedings, it was revealed that the fatal shot that struck Byron Turner in the head was intended for someone else in the group of people present on the street that evening. As a result of his guilty plea, the weapons charges were dropped, and he was sentenced to 30 years in state prison without the possibility of parole.
