Jeremy Lavender, 24, was found slumped behind the wheel of a wrecked Honda Accord beneath Interstate 59 in the 300 block of Oporto-Madrid Boulevard North on the afternoon of January 28, 2019. Officers arrived about 4:20 p.m.; Lavender was unresponsive and later pronounced dead at UAB Hospital. What initially appeared to be a traffic crash shifted into a shooting investigation when detectives found multiple shell casings near Oporto-Madrid Boulevard and 4th Avenue South and later determined Lavender had suffered a gunshot wound before the car came to rest under the overpass.

Police described the scene as the endpoint of a violent encounter in which Lavender apparently tried to flee after gunfire erupted. No arrest was reported in the immediate aftermath, but on June 22, 2019, Birmingham police announced the custody of two men, Deandreus Hines, 24, and Morris Davis, 23, who were charged with capital murder and later indicted by a Jefferson County grand jury in November 2019. If anyone witnessed the shooting, the events leading up to the crash, or has information about Lavender’s last movements, please share what is known.