WEST CHESTER, Pa. (KYW Newsradio) — Six people, including one juvenile, have been arrested in connection with the death last summer of a 20-year-old man in Coatesville.
Investigators on Friday released the names of five adults and the initials of one juvenile, as they filed charges in the homicide of Dametrious McClain-Jackson, a Lycoming College football player, on Aug. 23, 2023.
According to a joint statement from the Chester County District Attorney’s Office and the Coatesville Police Department, one of the six defendants fired the fatal shot at McClain-Jackson, and all six have been charged with first-degree murder, conspiracy and related offenses.
On the night of Aug. 23, Coatesville police responded to a report of a shooting in the area of Madison and Lime streets in the city’s West End section. There, they found McClain-Jackson with a gunshot wound to his torso. He was transported to Paoli Hospital, where he was pronounced dead.
The D.A. and Coatesville police say his death came at the end of a chaotic day.
In their statement, authorities say McClain-Jackson and the six defendants were riding around Coatesville in a stolen car that night, looking for a rival and his friends who had posted something on Instagram about a prior shooting.
They found their intended targets on Community Lane in Coatesville, and McClain-Jackson and defendants Richard Rochester-Cottle, 21, Victor Lara-Ortiz, 19, and Garry White, 19, exited the vehicle and engaged in a gunfight with the rival group, then fled back to the car.
It was there that McClain-Jackson told the defendants he had been shot.
Zaire Harley, 19, and Markel Jones, 21, are also charged in connection with the homicide.