Lamar Jerome French, a 38-year-old man from Newport News, Virginia, was tragically killed on September 16, 2019, while working as a driver for a transportation network company. On that day, French picked up a passenger, 21-year-old Elijah Dayron Armstrong of Newport News. Unbeknownst to French, his passenger was involved in other violent crimes that same day. There is no indication that French and Armstrong had any prior acquaintance.
The fatal encounter occurred in Hampton, Virginia.
French was found with a gunshot wound in a parking lot at Phoebus High School. Emergency medical services transported him to a local hospital, where he ultimately succumbed to his injuries. The investigation quickly identified his passenger, Armstrong, as the suspect in the homicide. The motive behind the shooting of the rideshare driver was not immediately clear to investigators or French's grieving family.
Elijah Dayron Armstrong turned himself in to the Newport News police on the evening of the shootings. In connection with the death of Lamar French, he was charged with first-degree murder, use of a firearm in the commission of a felony, and discharge of a firearm within 1000 feet of a school. Armstrong was also identified as the suspect in another homicide that occurred earlier the same day at an Exxon gas station in Newport News, where Luis Zambrana Jr. was shot and killed. Armstrong was taken into custody and held in the Newport News City Jail. In January 2021, the murder and firearm charges against him in the death of Luis Zambrana Jr. were certified to a grand jury in Newport News. He was also scheduled for a court appearance in Hampton General District Court in March 2021 for the charges related to Lamar French's death.
