LAS VEGAS (KLAS) — The Clark County coroner’s office has identified the 11-year-old boy who was shot to death in his stepfather’s car during a freeway road-rage incident that brought traffic to a halt Friday morning.
Brandon Dominguez-Chavarria, 11, was killed in a road rage shooting on Friday, Nov. 14. The coroner listed his cause of death as a gunshot wound to the head, with the manner being homicide.
“This child was on his way to school today, and lives have been changed dramatically,” Henderson Police Chief Reggie Rader said during a news conference hours after the shooting.
The shooting happened at around 7:30 a.m. on the 215 westbound near Gibson Road, when two vehicles “engaged in a road-rage exchange,” police said.
“They began jockeying for positions, trying to pass each other on the congested freeway. One vehicle tried to pass the other vehicle on the shoulder, and at this time, both occupants of the vehicles rolled down their windows and got into a verbal exchange,” Rader said.
The suspect, later identified as Tyler Matthew Johns, 22, pulled a handgun and shot into the other vehicle, striking the 11-year-old boy in the backseat, police said.
Tyler Matthew Johns, 22, was arrested for open murder and discharging a firearm into an occupied vehicle. (Henderson Police Department)
Following the shooting, the boy’s stepfather rammed Johns’s vehicle, causing them both to come to a stop on the freeway, where they got into an argument. A passing Las Vegas Metropolitan patrol unit stopped and arrested Johns.
Medical personnel took Dominguez-Chavarria to a nearby hospital, where he died from his injuries
Johns appeared virtually in Henderson Justice Court on Saturday morning on multiple felony charges, including open murder with a deadly weapon, discharging a firearm from or within a structure or vehicle within a prohibited area, and discharging a firearm into an occupied structure, according to court records.
Johns remains in custody without bail and was scheduled to return to court on Tuesday, according to court records.
Nevada law generally denies bail to defendants who face first-degree murder charges. Bail could be readdressed at a later date.
Dominguez-Chavarria’s family has set up a GoFundMe here.
