Massive, deadly 4th of July Birmingham shootout was ‘payback’ for justified 2021 homicide, prosecutor says

A massive, deadly shootout at a downtown Birmingham intersection on the Fourth of July is believed to have been a retaliation killing from a 2021 homicide that was ruled justifiable.

Montez Malike Ollison, a 28-year-old Fultondale man, is charged with capital murder in the slaying of 45-year-old Deitrich Lamont Boone Sr.

Boone was killed in a hail of gunfire about 2:15 p.m. that Thursday at 25th Street and Seventh Avenue North.

New details released in the case indicate that Boone fatally shot Travio Ollison, a family member of Martez Ollison, three years ago. He was not charged with any crime because it was ruled self-defense.

Ollison appeared Wednesday before Jefferson County District Judge William Bell for a preliminary hearing.

"This was payback, street justice,'' said Jefferson County Deputy District Attorney Charissa Henrich told the court.

After hearing testimony from Birmingham homicide Det. Kristopher Hatcher, the judge ruled there was enough evidence to send the case to a grand jury for indictment consideration and denied Ollison bond.

"This does, to me, look like a retaliation murder," Bell said.

North Precinct officers responded to a call of a person shot at the intersection that day, which is in the middle of an area that includes Park Place Apartments, Marconi Park, and the Jones Valley Teaching Farm.

When they arrived, police found a gray Chrysler 300 that had crashed into a tree and a utility pole.

Boone was found about 15 yards away in a grassy are outside of an apartment building. He was

Crime scene investigators placed more than 50 evidence marks along Seventh Avenue North. Evidence markers don't necessarily indicate just one shell casing – a marker can be used to mark multiple shell casings in one spot.

"We have at least 50 shell casings near where kids play, families gather all the time,'' Officer Truman Fitzgerald said that day. "Anytime you have this many rounds being fired, we are extremely lucky no one else was hit."

A woman who posted a Facebook Live video of the aftermath reported seeing at least one of the shooters - wearing a ski mask - hanging out a window firing the gun.

It appears Boone was able to return fire before he collapsed. A gun was found near his body.

Hatcher testified that investigators spoke with Boone's girlfriend, who told them that she believed his death was in retaliation for Travio Ollison's death in 2021. She pointed detectives to posts on Facebook "celebrating" Boone's death.

Travio Ollison, 19, was shot to death Monday, April 5, 2021, while trying to help settle a dispute in north Birmingham. That fatal shooting happened to the 1900 block of Druid Hills Drive.

Police at the time said the deadly shooting stemmed from an altercation between two people who were living together. Both parties, he said, called Travio Ollison to the location and he intervened in the dispute.

A physical altercation then took place and Ollison was shot and killed. The Jefferson County District Attorney's Office later that month ruled no charges would be filed.

Hatcher also testified that casings found at the scene were tested and entered into the National Integrated Ballistic Information Network, also known as NIBIN. The casings were matched to a 9mm gun that was found in Montez Ollison's Fultondale apartment during an unrelated robbery investigation.

Someone else living with him at Stoney Brook Apartments was the suspect in the unrelated robbery case, Hatcher said.

Investigators then analyzed Ollison's cell phone, and mapping placed his phone in the area of Boone's killing at the time of the deadly shooting, Hatcher said.

The detective said there were shooters involved in Boone's death, but only Ollison has been identified and charges.

Ollison's attorney, Ontario Tillman, said during the hearing that there was nothing to directly implicate Ollison in Boone's death – no eyewitness who would pick him out of a lineup and no DNA.

Tillman also pointed out that Ollison's phone being in the vicinity of Boone's killing only proved the phone was there, not Ollison. And, he said, the gun found in Ollison's apartment could have been brought in by someone else living there.

"They don't have anything to link my client to this particular charge,'' Tillman said. "This is the state overreaching, trying to find someone to blame."

Prosecutor Henrich disagreed.

"The defendant's phone records place him there. The shell casings place him,'' she said. "Certainly, if he was somewhere else, he had the opportunity to tell Det. Hatcher where he was."

"Obviously he has the right not to speak with the detective,'' Henrich said, "but he had a perfect opportunity to explain he was not there, and he chose not to do it."

Ollison, taken into custody in October, remains held without bond in the Jefferson County Jail.