On the evening of September 20, 2024, gunshots shattered the quiet in the 300 block of South McDaniels Street in Kinston, North Carolina. When Kinston Police Department officers arrived around 8:50 p.m., they found two people with gunshot wounds. One was Korie Williams, a 25-year-old Black man from Kinston. Medics rushed him toward UNC Lenoir Health Care, but he was pronounced deceased en route. The second victim, 18-year-old Yameek Coward, was also taken to the hospital and later transferred to ECU Health Medical Center for further treatment.
The investigation soon revealed that two other people were targeted in the attack. Lyasia Lawson was treated for injuries and released from the hospital, while a fourth individual, Deshakeen Turnage, was present during the shooting but was not injured.
Detectives began piecing together evidence and on September 23, 2024, secured arrest warrants for 21-year-old Bryson Bradley of Lenoir County, charging him with murder and attempted murder.
Less than a month later, on October 17, 2024, police arrested a second suspect. Officers took 18-year-old Savannah Locklear of Kinston into custody at a convenience store on East Highland Avenue. She was charged with murder, three counts of attempted first-degree murder, three counts of discharging a weapon into occupied property, and three counts of assault with a deadly weapon with intent to kill. Locklear was taken to the Lenoir County Jail.
While Locklear was in custody, Bryson Bradley remained a fugitive. For over a year, law enforcement searched for him. The manhunt came to an end on March 4, 2026, when the U.S. Marshals Service located and arrested Bradley in New York. Authorities noted that at the time of his capture, he was wearing a shirt that read “Notice Me.”
Bradley was slated for extradition back to North Carolina to face charges. An indictment against him includes one count of first-degree murder, four counts of attempted first-degree murder, three counts of discharging a weapon into an occupied property, and four counts of assault with a deadly weapon with intent to kill. As of his arrest in March 2026, the case against both suspects was moving forward through the judicial process.
