Crime

16-year-old Macon boy shot dead outside Houston Avenue food mart, officials say

A 16-year-old Macon boy was shot and killed Monday night outside a Houston Avenue food mart, officials said.

In a statement about the 8 p.m. incident in the parking lot of Friend’s Food Mart, Bibb County sheriff’s officials said “a group of males” had been outside the store when one of them was shot.

Further details were not immediately available.

Coroner Leon Jones said the victim, Kymelo Early, would have turned 17 at the end of May. Jones said Early was pronounced dead at a downtown hospital at 8:59 p.m.

A young man was arrested soon after the shooting.

Ja’Kobe Alonzo Archie, 21, of Macon, was jailed on an involuntary manslaughter charge and was being held without bond Tuesday morning at the county lockup.

Early’s slaying was the county’s 21st homicide of 2022.

Nineteen of the deaths have been the result of gunshot wounds.

Six of the 21 violent deaths happened in January. Six more, including the shooting death of an armed Florida man by police along Interstate 75, were in February. Four were in March and three were in April.

Monday night’s death was the second homicide this month.

There were 54 homicides countywide last year.

Information from Telegraph archives contributed to this report.

This story was originally published May 9, 2022 at 10:29 PM.

Joe Kovac Jr.
The Telegraph
Joe Kovac Jr. writes about local news and features for The Telegraph, with an eye for human-interest stories. Joe is a Warner Robins native and graduate of Warner Robins High. He joined the Telegraph in 1991 after graduating from the University of Georgia. As a Pulliam Fellowship recipient in 1991, Joe worked for the Indianapolis News. His stories have appeared in the Washington Post, the Seattle Times and Atlanta Magazine. He has been a Livingston Award finalist and won numerous Georgia Press Association and Georgia Associated Press awards.
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