Recent slayings push city past 2016 total

Within a 16-hour period, four people were killed in three unrelated shootings to push Columbus’ homicide total this year to 107 — one more than all of 2016.

In the first of two shootings on Tuesday, a teenage girl and a man died, and a woman was wounded. That occurred around 2:30 p.m. in the 4000 block of Alwood Lane in the Winchester Park Apartments on the Southeast Side, said Sgt. Stan Latta, supervisor of the second-shift homicide unit.

Responding officers and paramedics found the girl, JoJo Holloway, 17, dead inside the apartment. Brent D. Black, 31, a wounded man whom paramedics tried to help, died on the way to OhioHealth Grant Medical Center, Latta said. The woman, Melisa Mora, 30, was taken to Grant with injuries. She had stabilized and will survive, Latta said.

Detectives hadn’t yet talked with her by Tuesday evening, but it’s believed the shooter and the three victims all knew one another.

Jordan Marquane Aekins, 21, was charged with two counts of murder in the shooting and was being held in the Franklin County jail Tuesday night. Latta said he ran from the shooting scene, but was captured without incident about a mile away.

A little more than a halfhour later, two men were shot on the Northeast Side, Latta said.

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