Dominique Alexander Spear, 24, was shot dead on September 23, 2014, in the parking lot of the Callier Forest Apartments in Rome, Georgia. The fatal encounter followed a dispute that began a month earlier at a sports bar over a cigarette and a subsequent fight that left bad blood between Spear and Kyle Devonte Timmons.

Witnesses described a scuffle when the two men met in the apartment complex; Timmons then raised his arm and two shots from a .22 caliber pistol were fired. One bullet struck Spear in the chest and the other entered the back of his neck. Timmons fled, discarded the firearm, then went to a nearby house and told the resident he had shot someone before being arrested.

At trial Timmons testified he acted in self-defense and claimed he found the gun on Spear. In October 2015 a Floyd County Superior Court jury convicted Timmons of felony murder, aggravated assault, and aggravated battery, though he was acquitted of malice murder; his convictions were largely upheld on appeal in 2017.