On the night of April 12, 2025, 27-year-old Montine Wiley Jr. was working as a security guard at a crowded private event at Green Door Distilling Co. in Kalamazoo when he was shot while escorting a patron out of the venue. Witnesses say the man Wiley was leading into the parking lot produced a firearm; Wiley collapsed in his uncle’s arms with a gunshot wound to the chest and was taken to a local hospital, where he was pronounced dead.

Wiley was described as a business owner, a father with another child on the way, and an advocate who mentored at-risk youth against gun violence. The Kalamazoo Department of Public Safety opened an investigation and sought help from the public after the shooting, which occurred amid a crowd of more than 200 people.

That investigation led to arrests of three men. Eighteen-year-old Kaiden Tanner Cole of Battle Creek was charged with open murder, felony firearm, and carrying a concealed weapon; 22-year-old Damonte Jenkins-Gooden was charged with tampering with evidence and felony firearm after allegedly taking Wiley’s security weapon from the scene; and 20-year-old Oscar David Wygant was charged with Accessory After the Fact to a Felony after allegedly driving Cole and Jenkins-Gooden away and later telling police Cole admitted the shooting.

Does anyone have information about Wiley’s work as a mentor or who witnessed the escorting incident that night?