Police ask for help finding killer of young mother
NEWPORT NEWS — Police made a plea for help Tuesday afternoon to find the person who killed a 20-year-old Newport News mother over two years ago.
Breonna T. Patterson, 20, was shot to death on Aug. 29, 2018, police said in a video this week.
Officers arrested a man six days later, but a judge found no probable cause in the case, and the suspect was released.
Police spokeswoman Sarah Ketchum said this week’s video is part of the department’s effort to highlight unsolved cases. The program started over the summer.
The day of the homicide, dispatchers were called shortly before 4 a.m. about gunshots at City Line Apartments in the 100 block of Mytilene Drive, off 76th Street.
Police said neighbors heard arguing and then gunshots. When officers arrived, they found Patterson dead, as well as multiple shell casings.
Police later received a tip about a suspect in the case, Markies Lamar Parks, who was 25 at the time and lived in Newport News.
The police department’s Tactical Operations Unit was dispatched on Sept. 4, 2018, to the 1500 block of Briarfield Road in Hampton to find him because they believed he was armed and dangerous. He surrendered without incident around 7:30 p.m. that day, police said.
Parks was charged with one count each of first-degree murder, use of a firearm in commission of a felony and possession of a firearm by a convicted felon, Ketchum wrote in an email this week.
Parks had a preliminary hearing for the charges on April 1, 2019, but due to witness issues at that hearing, the judge found no probable cause, said Valerie S. Muth, deputy of administration and special projects for the Newport News Office of the Commonwealth’s Attorney.
“This case remains open for further police investigation and charges may be taken out later should sufficient evidence be developed,” Muth wrote in an email Wednesday morning.
Parks’ lawyer, Romeo Lumaban, said the case never made it to circuit court for a trial.
“Since he was arrested on felony warrants, he was entitled to have a preliminary hearing in general district court,” Lumaban said on the phone Wednesday afternoon. “It’s essentially for the district court judge to determine whether there is sufficient evidence for the case to be certified to the grand jury.”
He said there wasn’t enough evidence for the general district court judge to certify the case, so “the charges were dismissed.”
Parks told news outlets in 2018 that he was innocent. He said the tips were meant to set him up, and that he was with his girlfriend at a house during the shooting. His family could vouch for him, he said.
“They even know I didn’t do it, because I was around them,” he said.
Investigators said Parks and Patterson knew each other, but Parks said that may have only been in passing around the neighborhood or at parties.
Police said Patterson had a 1-yearold daughter when she died.
Her mother told officials she was loved by many, she was free-spirited and curious, living for the moment.
“Not a day goes by that we don’t hear or share stories about her,” her mother told police.
Police ask that anyone with information about Patterson’s case call the Crime Line at 1-888-LOCKU-UP.