A young boy who escaped a juvenile detention facility in Missouri after being charged with homicide faces murder and other counts in a separate shooting of a man who was slain while FaceTiming with his mother. Jonathon Xavier Jones, 19, is charged with murder, armed criminal action, and unauthorized use of a firearm in the death of Jadun M. Byrd, 19. Jones, who was 17 at the time of the fatal shooting, has been cleared to stand trial as an adult, authorities say. Jones was already in detention on separate charges and remains there, according to officials.
The murder occurred on March 2, 2022, in the 2400 block of Whittier Street in St. Louis, according to a probable cause statement.
Police were called to a shooting. When authorities arrived, they discovered the man lying in a parking lot, suffering from gunshot wounds. He died in the hospital.
A witness informed investigators that when the victim walked into the parking lot, he spotted a white Dodge Journey driving about the area and parking in a nearby driveway. The witness told police that as the Journey approached the victim, someone on the driver’s side pulled down the window and began shooting him, according to the affidavit.
Leslie Byrd, the victim’s mother, told police she heard bullets fired while FaceTiming with her son at the time of the murder.
“She saw her son hit the ground and could only see his face,” the probable cause statement read. Leslie Byrd told NBC St. Louis station KSDK that her son was in a parking lot that morning, waiting to see her at work.
“‘They just shot that boy up,'” she reported hearing someone say. “And then somebody accidentally kicked the phone and I saw his head just roll and his hands curled up.”
“They didn’t even rob him,” she explained. “They took nothing from him. They just pulled up, shot, and drove away.”
According to the probable cause statement, police swiftly linked the suspect to the killing after seeing CCTV footage of Journey circling and following the victim.
Surveillance video captured a guy, later identified as Jones, getting into the vehicle and driving away approximately 30 minutes before the murder. It also showed him 30 minutes after the killing, returning to the vehicle and departing on the driver’s side. When authorities found the Journey, they discovered the suspect’s fingerprints on the driver’s side.
A search of the suspect’s home brought up many firearms, including one that matched ballistic evidence collected at the murder scene, according to the affidavit. According to authorities, Jones’ phone was placed in “Airplane Mode” just before the homicide and removed shortly after the crime.
Jones was on the run at the time of the shooting after escaping from a juvenile detention center where he was facing a charge in a pending homicide case, according to the probable cause statement as per Lawandcrime.
Jones is accused, along with two others, of killing a 29-year-old man in September 2021, according to authorities. The next month, he fled from a juvenile jail facility with another kid. Officials stated the trial for the 2021 homicide and escape case is still proceeding.