Trial date set for ‘mobile mass shooter’ who killed WM woman

Ezekiel Kelly will face charges next July in 2022 murder case

By Ralph Hardin

news@theeveningtimes.com

A man who terrorized the Mid-South one night two years ago in a frenzied rampage that had the residents of three states on high alert will finally have his case tried by a jury of his peers.

Ezekiel Kelly, now 22, faces the death penalty if convicted of first-degree murder in a daylong shooting rampage that paralyzed the Memphis Metropolitan Area and left three people dead and three others wounded.

After more than two years since that harrowing night, and after numerous delays, continuances, legal filings, changes in representation and other judicial red tape, Kelly will stand trial — in eight months.

Last Friday, in Kelly’s latest appearance, a judge has set his murder trial for July 2025.

Kelly has pleaded not guilty to more than two dozen State of Tennessee felony charges stemming from the September 2022 so-called “mobile mass shooting,” which led to a citywide shelter-in-place order and a frantic manhunt that spanned from DeSoto County, Mississippi, to Crittenden County, Arkansas, as Shelby County law enforcement agencies struggled to communicate accurate information regarding Kelly’s activities to the public.

Judge James Jones Jr. set Kelly’s trial for July 14 during a brief hearing.

Case History

Kelly, just 19 at the time of the shooting spree, was charged in the deaths of Dewayne Tunstall, Richard Clark and Allison Parker.

During a news conference in March 2023, Shelby County District Attorney Steve Mulroy said prosecutors plan to seek death if Kelly is found guilty of first-degree murder.

Mulroy listed factors for his decision to file a notice to seek the death penalty, including that it was a random mass shooting and that Kelly has a prior conviction for aggravated assault. At least three witnesses saw Kelly shoot Tunstall during a gathering at a Memphis home at about 1 a.m. on Sept. 7, 2022, according to a police affidavit. Clark and Parker were shot later that day, as Kelly was driving around Memphis, livestreaming some of his activities, authorities said.

Police said three other people were wounded in the shootings. An indictment also charges Kelly with reckless endangerment with a deadly weapon, commission of an act of terrorism, theft of property and evading arrest.

The shootings led to the shutdown of Memphis’ public bus system, the lockdown of two college campuses and the stoppage of a minor league baseball game.

Kelly carjacked at least two vehicles before he was arrested when he crashed a stolen car while fleeing police, authorities said.

Police first said that four people were killed, but later revised the total to three after investigators found that one of the deaths was not related to the rampage.

A History of Violence

The violence unfolded just a few months after Kelly was released early from a threeyear prison sentence for a pair of shootings in 2020.

In February of that year, Kelly, then 17, was charged as an adult with attempted firstdegree murder and other crimes in two shootings committed a few hours apart. Both victims survived but did not cooperate with prosecutors, according to court records, and Kelly pleaded guilty to reduced charges of aggravated assault in April 2021.

Kelly was sentenced to three years in prison but was released after serving just over two years, including credit he received for the time he was jailed before his plea.

Local Connection

Allison Parker, a Crittenden County resident, was a mother of three who worked as a medical assistant at a clinic in West Memphis.

Richard Clark worked as a campus safety officer at Christian Brothers University after retiring from a career as a corrections officer.

File photo