The Macon Judicial Circuit District Attorney’s Office announced the resolution of the remaining cases stemming from the January 30, 2020, murder of Johntaves Dangelo Coleman during a botched armed robbery at his home on Moreland Avenue in Macon.
Coleman was at home with three friends watching a basketball game on the evening of January 30, 2020. At about 7:30 p.m., Coleman answered a knock at his door. His friends then heard a single gunshot; Coleman ran back into the house and collapsed. None of his friends saw the shooter, and Coleman died from a single gunshot wound to the chest shortly afterward.
A neighborhood witness identified a vehicle in the area at the time of the shooting, and nearby store surveillance captured the same vehicle along with four people getting in and out of it around the time of the homicide. Three days later, then-17-year-old Johniya Latice Chappell came forward and confessed her involvement, telling investigators she and her co-defendants, Xytwuan Monjai Calloway, Terrance L. Ates, and Shawn Robinson, had planned an armed robbery. Chappell said Calloway rang the doorbell alongside her, and that when Coleman came to the door, Calloway ran off, startling her into firing the shot that killed Coleman. She then fled the scene. Chappell and Coleman were previously acquainted; Coleman had allowed her to stay in his home during a difficult period and continued to help her with school supplies and money even after learning she had stolen from him.
Chappell pleaded guilty on August 14, 2023, to Voluntary Manslaughter and Aggravated Assault and was sentenced to 50 years, with the first 25 to be served in prison. Calloway and Robinson, who served as accomplices in the robbery plot, have each been sentenced to 20 years, with nine to be served. Ates has been found incompetent to stand trial at this time, and his case remains pending.
“A robbery plot hatched among four people ended a man’s life, and today two more have answered for the roles they played,” said Macon Judicial Circuit District Attorney Anita Howard. Calloway and Robinson’s sentences reflect that planning and participating in an armed robbery carries real consequences, even for those who did not pull the trigger. Our work in this case is a reminder of why we invest so much in reaching young people before they make choices like these.”