Killer stashed gun in drain, then lied about calling 911, cop says of Macon slaying

Jimmie Lee Daniel led a hard life.

Originally from Albany, he had been in and out of prison at least four times since 1986.

He was freed most recently in 2010 after doing time for burglary and aggravated assault.

Daniel went by a string of aliases — Willie Calloway, Jimmy Greene, Jimmy Walker and Bobby Norta among them.

His obituary put out by a south Georgia funeral home listed his name as Jimmy Lee Daniels.

At age 67, he was living in a run-down brick duplex on a hidden back street two blocks from a graveyard in east Macon’s Fort Hill neighborhood.

He had been dead a couple of days when the police found him fatally shot on his kitchen floor the evening of Feb. 22. One bullet hit him in the chest. Another struck his arm.

A week or so later, in early March, a man who had lived with him was arrested and charged with murder.

Now Bibb County sheriff’s investigators think they know why Daniel was killed.

He had been sharing his Elder Street apartment with a man named Phillip Rozier Sr.

The evening investigators began piecing together details of Daniel’s death, Rozier was at the scene outside the pair’s apartment, which sits less than half a mile north of the entrance to the Indian Mounds.

Rozier, 53, at first told the cops that he had been the one who called 911 to report finding Daniel’s body, according to testimony at a commitment hearing for Rozier on Monday at the Bibb County jail where Rozier is being held.

Investigator Daniel Shurley testified that Rozier told him that the last time Rozier saw his housemate Daniel was two days earlier, on Feb. 20.

Rozier said he had moved across town to live with a relative and that he had dropped by Daniel’s place to collect some belongings the evening of Feb. 22 and discovered Daniel’s body.

According to Shurley, Rozier said he walked out and dialed 911.

“We were able to disprove that,” Shurley said in court Monday, adding that according to 911 logs someone who lived nearby was the person who called.

As the investigation progressed, a man who lives in the area told Shurley that Rozier had told him that Rozier said he was going to kill Daniel.

The reason? Rozier claimed Daniel had stolen some of Rozier’s stuff, authorities say.

After the shooting, a key witness in the case told Shurley that he followed Rozier on foot for about a tenth of a mile to a drain pipe at the intersection of Magnolia Drive and Ramona Avenue.

Shurley testified Monday that the witness saw Rozier toss a black plastic bag into the drain. The witness later took Shurley to the spot. Shurley found the bag. It had a loaded .38-caliber pistol with three spent shell casings inside.

Another person later told the police that after the killing, Rozier went to the person’s house and admitted killing Daniel, Shurley said.

In searching Daniel’s house, in the room where Rozier slept, investigators reportedly found “numerous” rounds of .38-caliber ammunition, Shurley said.

“A lot of the people in the neighborhood were scared of Mr. Rozier,” the investigator said.

Rozier, who said nothing at the hearing, has declined to discuss the case with investigators.

This story was originally published April 3, 2017 at 5:38 PM with the headline "Killer stashed gun in drain, then lied about calling 911, cop says of Macon slaying."