On the night of July 13, 2024, 17-year-old Nuer Deng was fatally shot while sitting in the back of a car in the WinCo Foods parking lot in West Valley City. Deng, a student at Judge Memorial Catholic High School and a member of a Sudanese tribe, was with two friends when an Infiniti pulled up behind their vehicle. A passenger in the Infiniti rolled down a window and opened fire; one shot struck Deng in the chest. His friends drove him to a nearby neighborhood where residents called 911. Paramedics transported him to a local hospital, but he died shortly after arrival.

Investigators say Deng was an innocent bystander and that the intended target was one of his friends, tied to an ongoing dispute over a former girlfriend and reported tribal tensions. West Valley City police identified two suspects in the Infiniti as 18-year-old Mare Biel of Glendale, Arizona, and 17-year-old Bevan Kuajian of West Valley City, alleging Kuajian drove and Biel fired. Both were tracked to Omaha, Nebraska, and arrested; charges include first-degree felony murder, obstruction of justice, and multiple counts of discharging a firearm.

If anyone has information about Deng, the shooting, or the events that night, please share what is known.