Police investigate third shooting near NC Central University campus
Durham police are investigating another shooting near N.C. Central University’s campus, according to recently released court documents.
On Dec. 8 police responded to a report of a shooting at the intersection of Pekoe Avenue and Fayetteville Street. The location is across the street from both the NCCU police headquarters and campus.
Officers found a black 2008 Nissan Maxima with one bullet hole in the passenger side window and a 22-year-old man sitting by the driver’s side front tire. The man, who was taken to Duke University Hospital, told police he was shot while driving.
The man was not a student at NCCU, university spokesperson Ayana Hernandez in an email.
“North Carolina Central University continues to work closely with our partners in the City of Durham and Durham County to address safety in and around the university community and protect the well-being of our students, faculty, staff and campus visitors,” Hernandez wrote.
Three homicides
In recent months, Durham police have investigated three killings on or near the campus.
▪ On Sept. 20 Michael Askins, 43, died after being found shot in the 500 block of Dupree Street shortly after 1 p.m.
▪ On Sept. 18 Shamori Brown, 21, and Tavis Rhodes, 18, were taken to the hospital and died after being shot in an NCCU parking lot just after 9 p.m. The shooting happened during a home football game and locked down the nearby O’Kelly Riddick Stadium, The News & Observer reported. NCCU officials said no one involved was part of the university community.
After the first shooting, NCCU Chancellor Johnson O. Akinleye said NCCU is safe, but can’t control its borders.
“This press conference is a call to action,” Akinleye said, The News & Observer reported. “We are pleading with our city, our county and state officials to commit to devoting more resources and attention to combating the issues of crime in Durham, so that the lives of those on our campus, in the neighborhoods around us and the larger Durham community can be protected.
“We will not live in fear or have our health and well being at risk due to gun violence and crime around our community,” he said. “It has to stop today.”
Sept. 18 killings
Dezmond Armond Harper, 19, of Durham, was charged in the double killing on Sept. 18. When Harper was charged, he was in the Wake County jail awaiting trial another charge of murder.
Recently released search warrants provide some additional information on the double killing.
On Sept. 18 police found the two men lying on the ground shot, the warrant states. Surveillance video shows a Black Nissan Altima enter the parking deck from Lincoln Street and exit at the ground paved lot side. The Altima parks beside an SUV in the ground paved lot, the trunk opens and two women run away from the car.
Family members of the two dead men told police that the men had “beef” with someone named Dez or Dezmond from a kidnapping and possible rape that took place earlier in the year, the warrant states.
Police linked shell casings from the Durham homicide to a killing in Raleigh on Sept. 7. Harper drives a black Altima, a Raleigh detective told Durham police, the warrant states.
Durham police spoke to Harper and showed him a picture of the car.
“(Harper) said yes that is my car, and then no that’s not my car I had the color changed to grey and scraped the window tint off so I could get it inspected,” the warrant states.
Harper told the police that he played football with the two men who were killed at NCCU, the warrant states.
“(Harper) said he last spoke to Tavis when he called him and accused him of raping someone,” the warrant states.
Police later found the Altima on the 400 block of Marley Drive in Durham. The car had three shell casings that could be linked to the shooting parking deck shooting, the warrant states.
Harper is also listed as a suspect in Nov. 14, 2020 aggravated assault, the warrant states.
As of Dec. 11, 261 people had been shot in Durham this year, 39 of them fatally, The News & Observer reported.
In 2020, 297 people shot by that date and 30 people had been fatally shot. Durham has reported 47 homicides this year, more than in any year since at least 1995, the last year for which police have electronic records available.
This story was originally published December 22, 2021 at 5:32 PM with the headline "Police investigate third shooting near NC Central University campus."
