On the late morning of September 28, 2006, Montgomery Police Officer Keith Edwin Houts, 30, stopped a gray Impala on North Decatur Street. A two-year department veteran and U.S. Army Reserves member, Houts approached the vehicle and was shot in the head by the driver, Mario Dion Woodward. Woodward fired additional shots into Houts’ chest that were stopped by the officer’s protective vest. Houts was taken to Jackson Hospital and died of his wounds on September 30, 2006.

Woodward fled and was later captured in McDonough, Georgia, by the U.S. Marshals Service and extradited to Montgomery. He was charged with capital murder; a jury convicted him in 2008. During sentencing the jury recommended life without parole by an 8–4 vote, but the presiding judge overrode that recommendation and imposed the death penalty. The case drew attention for that judicial override and subsequent appeals.

If anyone knew Officer Houts or has information about the events surrounding the stop, please share what is known.