Police arrested a 20-year-old Little Rock man early Friday on first-degree murder charges hours after officers responded to the city's 39th homicide this year, a spokesman said.
Marcus Lane Ervin was in the Pulaski County jail on Friday without bond after he was arrested in the death of Christopher Little, 31, who was shot multiple times on a dead-end street in south Little Rock, said officer Tracy Brandon, a Little Rock police spokeswoman.
Investigators do not anticipate making another arrest in the killing, Lt. Michael Ford said Friday.
A 911 call at 6:17 p.m. Thursday drew Little Rock police officers to 5812 Palo Alto Drive, where Little was lying in the street with multiple gunshot wounds, Ford said Thursday.
Witnesses told police that three men were arguing in the street when one of the men began shooting, Ford said. Emergency responders pronounced Little dead at the scene, according to a police report.
Officers wrote that "items of evidentiary value" were found at the scene, but did not explain in the report.
Brandon said investigators identified Ervin as a suspect and arrested him at approximately 3 a.m. Friday at his home at 5311 Stanley Drive. After a police interview at the department's major crimes division, he was booked into the jail at 7:41 a.m.
Stanley Drive is approximately a mile from the crime scene. Little's home address is listed on Trenton Lane, which is approximately a half-mile away from where he was shot. Ford said Friday that the reason the men were in the area was not immediately clear.
The police report said investigators don't know the relationship between Little and Ervin. Officers listed the shooting weapon as a handgun.
Charles Hayes said he was in his kitchen making snacks Thursday evening when he heard three gunshots near the front of his home. When he walked to the window, he saw a body lying in the street.
"I went and got my cellphone and called 911," Hayes said. "And I looked back out there, and the streets were empty. But the body was still lying there."
Hayes said he and another neighbor went outside and checked on the man in the street. A 911 dispatcher asked Hayes if the man was alive, and Hayes said he didn't know.
"My neighbor, he was on the phone with 911, too, and they told him to turn the body over to see if he was breathing," Hayes said. "He wasn't, and we assumed he was dead. ... Police got there about 45 seconds later."
According to Hayes, the man had been shot in his head and in his chest. Hayes said he had seen Little in the area before but didn't know him personally.
The community on Palo Alto Drive is small and tight-knit, Hayes said. Police officers are rarely needed, and most of the people who live there know one another.
"I've been here 20 years, and we've never had something like this," Hayes said. "We've had a few little things ...but never something like this."
Ervin's only previous criminal charge was a possession of controlled substance arrest in November 2018, for which he was sentenced to three years' probation and a $1,000 fine, according to court records.
Little's death is the seventh homicide in September and the 39th this year. Three of the homicides in 2019 have been ruled justified. One of the most recent homicides -- the shooting death of 37-year-old Cedric Pennington on Sept. 19 -- occurred just down the street from Ervin's residence.
Deundre Watson, 18, was arrested in Pennington's death last week on a charge of manslaughter and was in the Pulaski County jail Friday in lieu of a $100,000 bond, according to the jail's roster.
In 2018, there had been 29 homicides by mid-September and there were 43 in total. In 2017, there had been 48 homicides by mid-September and 60 total.
Metro on 09/28/2019