Sunday marks six months since the tragic Dadeville mass shooting
October 15 marks six months since a tragic mass shooting in Dadeville at a sixteenth birthday celebration. Mike Segrest is the District Attorney for the 5th Judicial Circuit and he will be prosecuting all six defendants charged. Action 8’s Estee Morrison sat down with him to get an update about the cases.
On April 15, 2023 the unthinkable happened. Four young people were killed and thirty-two others injured when eighty-nine shots were fired into a crowd celebrating a sweet sixteen birthday party at a dance studio in Dadeville. Now, it is up to District Attorney Mike Segrest and his ten assistant district attorneys to sift through the evidence and get ready to try the six defendants. D.A. Mike Segrest says, “There is such a voluminous amount of evidence in this case bc of the number of victims, witnesses, forensic evidence, tens of thousands of pages of hospital records…then the forensic evidence and reports.”
Segrest expects many pre-trial motions to be filed by defense attorneys including attempts to transfer the trial venue and to separate the cases. D.A. Mike Segrest says, “Right now as it stands, the first 5 defendants have been indicted together, so now they are co-defendants, so as it stands, it would be one trial and a motion to sever could be something we may have to face.” Because jury terms are only held twice a year in Dadeville for two weeks at a time, if the 6 cases are tried separately, it could take three years to try all six defendants. D.A. Mike Segrest says, ” I believe justice delayed is justice denied and the accused need their day in court and the victims need closure and with a group of young people like this, they are going to be moving on with their lives…leaving the area, going to other places or the military…this is unique because of the large number of victims involved. ”
This case is close to Segrest’s heart, and he recently invited LaTonya Allen, whose son Philstavious Dowdell was killed in the shooting, her daughter Alexis Dowdell, and Alexis’s younger sister to see Drew Brees speak in Montgomery. D.A. Mike Segrest says, “This year they were recognizing victims of violent crime and I was able to extend an invitation to all of the victims and their families and we had a great turnout.”
The District Attorney’s office is waiting for the final investigation report from ALEA, and then they’ll put their trial plan together. Right now, because this is such a complex case, they’re still in the discovery phase. Each of the six defendants is charged with four counts of reckless murder and 25 counts of assault. Four of them have youthful offender court hearings scheduled for October 26.
