Jamarcus Marquez Roberts, 21, was shot and killed on July 20, 2014, in the parking lot of a Motel 6 on McFarland Boulevard in Tuscaloosa. The shooting came after an earlier altercation downtown; Roberts and the man later accused of shooting him, 21-year-old Skylar Pierre Hinton, were in separate groups who converged at the motel where the conflict flared again.

Roberts’ aunt said she had seen him earlier that night and that he stepped in to defend a smaller person who was being antagonized. Family members described Jamarcus as a happy person who was not prone to trouble. Hinton fled the scene after the shooting but later surrendered to the Tuscaloosa Police Department and was arrested on charges of murder and shooting into an unoccupied vehicle; he was booked into the Tuscaloosa County Jail.

What details about that night or those involved might help explain how the earlier downtown dispute escalated to deadly violence?