A 25-year-old man was shot and killed on a Hickory highway in the early hours of Sunday, December 7, 2025. At about 2:42 a.m., officers responded to reports of a shooting near Main Avenue Southwest and U.S. Highway 321 and found Austin Lee Matthew Miller of Lexington suffering fatal gunshot wounds; he was pronounced dead at the scene.

Investigators say the shooting was the deadly endpoint of an active domestic dispute that began earlier in Caldwell County and continued while the parties traveled along U.S. Highway 321 into Hickory. Police identified 32-year-old James Michael Church of Granite Falls as the person who shot Miller; Church remained at the scene when officers arrived. In the days immediately after the incident no charges had been filed and the investigation was described as ongoing.

Anyone with information about the events leading up to the shooting is asked to contact investigators.