On the evening of September 5, 2025, gunfire erupted in the parking lot of an apartment complex on South Walnut Street in Muncie. Two men were struck; 27-year-old Ashuntiz T. Stewart, known as Flame, was critically wounded and transported to IU Health Methodist Hospital in Indianapolis. He died of his injuries on Monday, September 8, 2025. A 24-year-old man shot that night was treated and listed in stable condition.

Police linked the Walnut Street shooting to multiple violent incidents across Muncie that night and pursued several leads. On September 9, 24-year-old Michael Leroy Jones was arrested on preliminary charges including unlawful possession of a firearm by a serious violent felon and criminal recklessness; court papers say he claimed he fired in self-defense. Investigators later identified 21-year-old Lamont Jaden Duane Howard and arrested him on unrelated warrants on September 18. By September 26 he was connected to the Walnut Street shooting and on October 6 the prosecutor charged him with murder in Stewart’s death, plus attempted murder and other felonies for a separate convenience-store shooting that same evening.

If anyone knew Ashuntiz Stewart or has information about the shootings that night, please share what you know.