Derick Michael Brown was a 21-year-old White man from Winfield, West Virginia, living in Huntington and attending Marshall University when he was shot and killed inside an apartment along Fourth Avenue near campus at about 2:20 a.m. on February 28, 2016. Investigators say an armed man entered the residence wearing a mask or full-face toboggan and initially confronted another resident; the encounter escalated into a physical struggle and an exchange of gunfire. Witnesses and police identified Joshua Earl Lomax McDowney of Huntington as the armed intruder.

Court testimony indicated Brown fired during the struggle but missed, and McDowney returned fire, a shot to Brown’s heart proving fatal. Evidence recovered nearby included a handgun and a bloody mask; forensic testing reportedly linked the mask blood to McDowney and matched shell casings to the pistol.

McDowney was arrested the same day and later indicted; he ultimately entered a Kennedy plea to first-degree murder and was sentenced to life with mercy.