To catch kid killers: How federal and local officials got justice for Z’Yon Person
The news of a 9-year-old boy killed in a drive-by shooting on his way to get snow cones spread quickly.
Over the next three years, the investigation and prosecution of the killers that followed pulled back the curtain on gang life in the Bull City, revealing armed rivals taunting each other on Instagram and hunting enemies on Durham’s streets.
Z’Yon Person was the third child under 10 years old gunned down in the city between 2014 and 2019.
But unlike in the other two cases, federal officials were able to pick up the investigation into Z’Yon’s death. It appears to be one of the first Durham gang cases prosecuted under the federal Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act.
Like the killings of 9-year-old Jaeden Sharpe in 2014 and 7-year-old Kamari Munerlyn in 2017, Zyon’s death was a retribution shooting.
Around 8:30 p.m. on Aug 18, 2019, three men in a Honda Accord mistook Z’Yon’s aunt’s SUV for rival gang members and two of them opened fire. They fatally shot Z’Yon and injured his then 8-year-old cousin in the arm.
The three men, members of the Northside Eight Trey Gangster Crips, were seeking revenge after the driver of the Honda, Antonio Nathaniel Davenport Jr., had been jumped days earlier at The Streets at Southpoint mall. Davenport also went by “Lil Tony” in the 83 Babies rap group.
The other two men in the Honda, Derrick Dixon, 27, and Dival Magwood, 24, pleaded guilty to two federal charges this past spring. In the gang, they were called demons, the gang’s title for shooters.
A jury convicted Davenport, 27, of three federal murder, gun and racketeering crimes in July. He was sentenced to life in prison plus 10 years last week.
Dixon was sentenced to life in prison. Magwood, who testified for the prosecution, was sentenced to 22 years.
Toll on courtroom
The gritty testimony had Z’Yon’s family wiping their tears, seemingly broken by the little boy’s death, and took a toll on the courtroom in general.
U.S. District Judge William Osteen was affected as well. During the final sentencing hearing Wednesday, he remarked how hard it must have been for Z’Yons aunt Danyell Ragland, who was driving the SUV, to make it to the hospital that August night.
Maybe a year ago, Osteen said, he might have looked at the number of kids who are shot or killed by gun violence and thought it’s “tragic” or “too many.”
“Now I look at that number, and I wonder how many times a parent has been racing to the hospital,” he said.
The judge also talked about the important role that police and witnesses played in this case.
Those factors and the U.S. Attorney’s Office Middle District of North Carolina’s involvement brought a justice more swift and stern than in Jaeden’s and Kamari’s cases. The judge didn’t mention those cases during his comments.
In 2017, Jaeden’s family was outraged when the culprit got 20 years after pleading to two second-degree murders: the killing of Jaeden in 2014 and the killing of a man in 2013. Prosecutors had indicated that the shooting was gang-related.
In June 2017, Kamari was shot in a drive-by while riding in a Honda Pilot with with his family to get hot dogs after a day at the pool. Prosecutors have suggested the two men charged with killing Kamari shot at the SUV in retribution for being shot at a earlier. The cases are still pending in Durham County court.
Justice for Z’Yon?
Osteen was nominated to the federal district judge seat in 2007 to succeed his father and namesake, according to profile in the NC Bar.
During the trial and hearings, he ran a tight but caring courtroom. When there were disruptions — an attorney’s phone beeping, a man whispering snitch during testimony, and Z’Yon’s younger cousins and siblings mumbling or crying — Osteen would start with warnings that he enforced without raising his voice or overly admonishing anyone.
During Magwood’s sentencing, Osteen started out by saying he can’t talk about politics but he can gauge public sentiment.
On one hand, voices are calling for police to be defunded, he said, but on the other, someone has to go out and seek justice for people like Z’Yon.
“Who is going to get justice for Z’Yon? Whatever position you take, please take an understanding that somebody has to go out there and wade into this sewer of a problem,” Osteen said.
In addition, Osteen said, people with information that can help an investigation have to come forward.
25 charges dismissed
A look at Davenport’s previous charges shows how hard it was for prosecutors to make them stick.
In 2016, Davenport was convicted in Durham County of second-degree burglary, larceny and speeding to elude arrest. He spent nearly two years in jail and prison, according to court documents.
From 2012 to 2018, however, Davenport faced more than 25 charges, the most serious including assault with a deadly weapon with intent to kill, trafficking opium, and robbery with a dangerous weapon.
All those charges were dismissed. Durham prosecutors cited not having enough evidence or witnesses, court records show.
Witness comes forward
In Z’Yon’s killing, one woman came forward and broke open the case, according to court statements.
Z’Yon was killed on Aug. 18, 2019, but Davenport didn’t get charged with murder until over a month later after his girlfriend shared information that connected him to the killing.
Davenport, who was wearing an ankle monitor during the killing related to pending domestic violence charges, was charged with the murder on Oct. 15. Dixon and Magwood were charged the next month.
Magwood started cooperating in December 2021, said Maria Jocys, a retired FBI agent who led the investigation of Z’Yon’s murder with assistance from Durham police and others.
Jocys said she believes Magwood decided to cooperate with prosecutors after he saw Dixon’s statement to FBI agents contending that Magwood was in the back seat of Davenport’s Honda shooting at Z’Yon’s aunt’s SUV.
Magwood testified and Dixon later conceded that Dixon was in the back seat shooting. Dixon was likely the one that killed Z’Yon, according to the evidence.
Davenport, who also shot at the SUV, drove, while Magwood, who was in the front passenger-side seat, had a gun but couldn’t get a shot, Magwod testified. Davenport has denied shooting at the SUV.
For prosecutors, Magwood not only served as a witness to the 2019 shooting, he also educated the jury on gang life and interpreted the language they used in rap songs and on social media messages linked to the case. The information was key for the prosecutor’s racketeering case and could pave the way for future prosecutions.
Investigators can pull phone and social media records, said Assistant U.S. Attorney JoAnna McFadden, but it makes a big difference when a defendant says who was there, what happened, and what the language means.
“You understand the story so much better,” she said.
Magwood’s insight and information opened the door, Osteen said, and we need to ask whether we are going to walk through the door.
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FBI watching Durham gangs
The FBI’s violent crime and gang task force had been investigating the Northside Eight Trey Gangster Crips since 2017 with the help of Durham law enforcement.
The Braggtown-based gang was responsible for a significant portion of the violent crime and drug sales in the Bull City, federal court documents show.
In 2019, the task force focused in on the Crips’ battle with their chief rival, a homegrown gang known as O-Block, along with others.
O-Block was formed to honor Kyle Maurice “O” Fisher, who was killed in August 2017. Some members of that gang thought an Eight Trey Gangster Crips was responsible, Jocys said.
Since then the O-Block has joined with other United Blood sets in its feud with the Eight Trey Gangster Crips, according to court documents.
The gang battles use Instagram to taunt and track rivals, followed by retaliatory shootings, one after the other.
For example, a December 2019 downtown Durham shooting followed an O-Block gang member taunting the Northside Crips on Instagram the night before a court appearance. The O-Block gang member was bragging about the number of rivals he had shot.
The next morning, gang members converged on the courthouse, where some had a hearing. After a scuffle in the courtroom, they spilled out onto the streets, with the Crips chasing and shooting at O-Block 9-Trey Gangster Blood members through downtown Durham.
The next day, O-Block dispatched members to a drive-by shooting at Oxford Manor, Northside Crips territory, Jocys said.
Witness statements posted on Instagram
Part of the reason the FBI took the case, Jocys said, was so they could protect Davenport’s girlfriend’s identity,
Providing information about gang activity can be dangerous for gang members and their associates, Jocys said.
“People have been assaulted, and people have been shot,” she said. “People have been killed.”
A key difference between state and federal court, Jocys said, is that North Carolina evidence rules let the defendant have access to and copy related paperwork.
What the FBI has seen, she said, is that gang members then post information about cooperating defendants on Instagram.
“They will post a photo of the incident report, circle the cooperator’s statement, highlight it, and then put rat emojis,” Jocys said.
In the federal system, defendants can’t possess or copy paperwork. Cooperators’ names are often redacted in evidence shared with the defendant until the case goes to trial, which is rare since most take pleas.
Culture of violence
Throughout last week’s sentencing hearings, Osteen asked Z’Yon’s family and even Magwood how to stop future killings.
Jocys, who is running for Durham County sheriff as an unaffiliated candidate in the November election, wasn’t able to attend the sentencing hearings. But she shared ideas with The News & Observer about stopping the cycle of violence pulsing through some of Durham’s neighborhoods.
In some neighborhoods, young people grow up dodging bullets and burying their friends and family.
The repetitive violence creates a situation where young people are experiencing trauma without ever being able to heal, she said.
“Instead, they are taking on these learned behaviors, and they are acting out with violence to express their emotions,” she said. “That is how they are problem solving.”
Jocys said intervention should start with middle school.
Police are familiar with the juveniles who keep showing up in reports, she said, and resources should be provided to them.
“Why don’t we have an intervention program that puts a team together and offers them an opportunity for anger management ... learning how to best address their anger, and managing that?” she said. Counseling services and programs should fill their time, especially in areas like Oxford Manor, where the gangs appear to be thriving.
“We need more programs, after-school things for kids,” and more mentors to intervene in young lives, she said.
Dixon told investigators he wished that had been the case for him.
“He said, ‘I wish I had a person who had stepped in and just been a mentor to me,’”Jocys said.
This story was originally published October 8, 2022 at 8:00 AM with the headline "To catch kid killers: How federal and local officials got justice for Z’Yon Person."
