‘Don’t play with guns,’ aunt of slain Bibb teen tells shooter in court. ‘Y’all are babies.’
The aunt of a Macon teenager gunned down three years ago in what prosecutors described as a “shootout” between former friends spoke in court Thursday, turning to a young man being sent to prison in the case and telling him she does not hate him.
The aunt also told the young man, 21, who had been best friends with her slain nephew, that he at least has a chance to turn his life around.
“If you have a son or sons one day, don’t let them make the same mistakes. Talk to them. Try to save them,” the aunt, Jessie Nicole Faulks, said. “You don’t play with guns. Y’all are babies. These consequences are terrible.”
Faulks was speaking on behalf of her nephew, Da’Kwaun T. Faulks, who was shot to death at age 18, caught in the crossfire during a shooting involving two friends of his who were feuding.
The shooting happened Aug. 19, 2018, near the intersection of Burton Avenue and Winifred Way, less than half a mile north of Henderson Stadium on the city’s west side.
The slain teen’s best friend, Dawan Daniels Jr., was in court Thursday pleading guilty to voluntary manslaughter and a gun charge. He had been charged with felony murder.
Before Daniels was sentenced to 25 years in prison, Nicole Faulks was allowed to address the court, to “put this nightmare behind me and my family.”
She described her slain nephew as “sunshine in my family’s life.”
“It does not bring me any joy to send Daniels off,” Nicole Faulks said. “I want Daniels to know he’ll get another chance. He might get a chance to get married, have children. I will never get that. My family will never get that. Da’Kwaun was 18. He was a baby. He was funny, beautiful. We loved him.”
The episode that ended his life broke out as he accompanied Daniels to a gathering that led to an armed confrontation between Daniels and Zontravion Hernandez.
Prosecutor Shelley Milton said Thursday that Daniels “knew that Mr. Hernandez would not straight-up fight him physically so he did bring a gun ... and a gun shootout of sorts ensued.”
Hernandez, now 21, pleaded guilty to voluntary manslaughter last summer and was sentenced to 20 years in prison. Hernandez was out on bond in the Faulks shooting when, early last year, he was arrested on a murder charge in the March 3, 2021, shooting of 16-year-old Ahmori Searcy at Majestic Gardens apartments on Rocky Creek Road.
On Thursday, Daniels sat quietly as Faulks’ aunt spoke to him and told the court, “I do not have any hate in my heart for him. He’ll get a second chance.”
She said what she wanted from him was an apology. “To know he felt bad,” she said.
Then the judge asked Daniels, who had sobbed in court earlier in the week, if he had anything to say.
Daniels turned his dead friend’s relatives and said, “I’m sorry to the family. I didn’t kill (Faulks). That was my best friend.”
Judge Howard Z. Simms told Daniels that while his bullet may not have killed Faulks, “you are just as responsible.”
This story was originally published March 24, 2022 at 1:32 PM.