Police arrest suspect in July 2 homicide
Security footage and witness cooperation allowed police to arrest and charge 20-year-old Mailik Phillips with criminal homicide on Wednesday in connection to last week’s shooting death at the Hamilton Inn.
On July 2, police responded to a report of a person shot at the inn in the 2700 block of Rossville Boulevard and found Damico Lawrence, 27, in a room dead from multiple gunshot wounds, according to court records.
An investigator was able to pull security video footage showing a black male wearing a red shirt with hair in colored dreadlocks leaving the room shortly after witnesses heard four or five gunshots. He was the only person seen leaving the room after the shots were fired.
An informant identified the suspect as Phillips. He was seen fleeing the scene in a blue Ford Escape
with tinted windows. Police were told Phillips borrowed the same vehicle earlier in the day and had access to the room Lawrence was found in.
Phillips was taken into custody by the Chattanooga Police Department’s fugitive unit with assistance from the United States Marshals Service and the Walker County Sheriff’s Office.
In addition to criminal homicide, he is charged with possession of a firearm during the commission of a dangerous felony. In Hamilton County, he previously has faced a drug charge, as well as a charge for theft of property over $10,000.
Hours after Phillips was arrested, another young man showed up at a local hospital with a minor gunshot wound at about 10 p.m. Dejuan Scott, 20, arrived in a private car and said he was shot outside a home in the 3800 block of Youngstown Road.
Investigations into both incidents are ongoing, and police ask anyone with information about them to call 423-698-2525.
Chattanooga has experienced 20 homicides in 2017, the same number that had been recorded by this time last year. By the end of 2016, there had been 32 homicides in Chattanooga.