On the morning of September 2, 2015, 21-year-old Dakota Rico was found shot multiple times and deceased in Saginaw, Michigan. He was discovered slumped over the steering wheel of his uncle’s pickup truck near Douglass and Youmans streets after a reported shots-fired call; the shooting occurred around 12:30 a.m. His family described the attack as an ambush, and his mother said she believed friends had set him up. Rico left behind a newborn daughter who was just a few months old.

The investigation produced no arrests for years, and the case went cold while the family held vigils and sought answers. The family said investigators had persons of interest but lacked enough evidence to charge anyone, and they expressed frustration at the slow progress. In January 2022 the Saginaw County Prosecutor’s Office charged Marcos Torres, then 25, with open murder, possessing a firearm as a felon, and two counts of possessing a firearm during the commission of a felony in connection with Rico’s killing.

Did anyone in Saginaw know Dakota, his routines, or who he was with that night?