Crime

Accused in a 2021 murder, Macon’s latest homicide victim had just bonded out of jail

The house at 1419 May Ave., just west of Pio Nono Avenue and south of Mercer University Drive in Macon’s Unionville neighborhood, is where Bibb County sheriff’s investigators believe Amond Rashad Norwood was shot the night of May 6, 2021.
The house at 1419 May Ave., just west of Pio Nono Avenue and south of Mercer University Drive in Macon’s Unionville neighborhood, is where Bibb County sheriff’s investigators believe Amond Rashad Norwood was shot the night of May 6, 2021. Bibb County Tax Assessor

A Macon man who was shot to death over the weekend had 12 hours earlier been released from jail on bond on charges in a fatal shooting at a dice game here last May.

Damian Devonta Felton Sr. was slain Saturday morning outside a house on Harrold Street, which intersects Jeff Davis Street about half a mile south of the Mercer University campus.

Felton, 27, was jailed last May on felony and malice murder charges in the death of 26-year-old Amond Norwood on May Avenue in the Unionville neighborhood.

Felton’s two co-defendants in Norwood’s slaying have remained in jail since their arrests a year ago this week.

The circumstances of Felton’s death on Saturday were not immediately clear, and it was not known whether investigators have identified a suspect.

His shooting, the county’s 22nd homicide of 2022, was reported at about 9 a.m. Saturday.

Felton was released on a $75,000 bond from the Bibb County jail — which lies eight blocks northeast of where he was killed — at 8:40 p.m. Friday, officials said.

According to a motion for bond filed in recent months by Felton’s lawyer, C. Alan Wheeler, Felton’s alleged role in the death of Amond Norwood was based on inconsistent accounts provided to police by a purported eyewitness to Norwood’s shooting.

The motion noted that Felton had been playing dice with Norwood at a house at 1419 May Ave. the evening of May 6, 2021.

The two had a fight that was said to have been broken up by two other men, Margaton Dudley and Jerome Beasley.

Felton, according to the motion, left the scene after that “to get away from Norwood” and never returned.

Investigators have said that Beasley shot Norwood and that Beasley and Dudley and Felton concealed Norwood’s death, hiding his body beneath a pile of mattresses in an illegal dump site along Churchill Street.

Norwood had been wearing an electronic ankle monitor at the time of his death, which investigators have said helped them track down his alleged killers.

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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