Last July’s fatal shooting of Marcus D. Martin, 41, inside his car in the parking lot of Whispering Oaks Apartments off of Harding Place has been solved.
James E. Johnson, 21, has been indicted by the Davidson County Grand Jury on a charge of first-degree murder. Evidence analysis by MNPD crime lab scientists strongly contributed to the identification of Johnson.
Officers responded to the apartment complex just before 8 a.m. on Saturday, July 27, 2024, concerning a vehicle crash. Martin was found deceased behind the wheel of a Nissan Altima and had been shot. Martin lived there and had left his apartment the night before to go to the store. The motive for his murder has not been determined. Robbery is a possibility.
At the time of his indictment, Johnson was already jailed on charges of attempted criminal homicide in two separate cases. He was arrested the day after the murder for shooting his brother at an Old Hickory Boulevard apartment complex in Hermitage. He was still in jail in August of last year when he was charged with attempted murder and aggravated assault for using his SUV to intentionally ram another on I-40 near the Briley Parkway interchange on February 14, 2023, which resulted in a crash. Johnson is alleged to have then fired multiple shots into the victim’s vehicle, wounding the passenger, before speeding away.
A Criminal Court judge set Johnson’s bond on the murder charge at $5,000,000.
