Thrown traffic cone leads to deadly Anchorage shooting, police say

Update 10:20 a.m. Tuesday:

Anchorage police have identified the victim in Sunday’s fatal shooting off East Tudor Road.

Officers have notified 43-year-old Franklin Stevens-McConkey’s family of his death, police said Tuesday in an updated statement.

Original story:

Anchorage police say an altercation outside an East Tudor Road restaurant late Sunday led to one man being fatally shot and another facing manslaughter charges in his death.

Javon Hill, 23, was arrested in the shooting near East Tudor and Dale Street, according to a police statement Monday morning. The victim hasn’t been publicly named as police notify his family.

According to a charging document against Hill, police received calls at about 10:30 p.m. Sunday reporting the shooting, in the parking lot of an Uncle Joe’s Pizzeria. Officers found the victim unconscious and shot in the chest; medics took him to a local hospital but he died overnight.

Police say a witness initially identified the shooter as Hill, telling officers Hill had driven to the restaurant to give friends a ride. Police dispatchers soon received a call from Hill.

“He stated that (the victim) attempted to jump him, and he shot someone and also hit his hand,” according to the charging document. 

Hill was taken into custody at his home about 15 minutes after the shooting, then treated at a local hospital.

According to the charging document, surveillance video from the restaurant showed the victim walking through the parking lot with two other men. It says he threw a traffic cone at Hill’s car and Hill got out to confront him.

“Javon’s right arm is extended toward (the victim) with what appears to be a handgun,” police said in the charges. “The interaction appears to be verbal but (then) quickly becomes physical and then several gunshots are fired.”

Afterward, police say the video showed Hill getting into the car and driving away.

When police spoke with Hill, he said that the men claimed he had nearly run them over in the parking lot. As one of the men approached the window of his car to speak with him, he said he grabbed a handgun from the door pocket. The traffic cone was thrown, Hill said, when he backed up to leave, according to the charges.

Hill told officers that when he got out of the car with his gun, the victim became hostile and approached him. He said he shot the man once, according to the charges, then two more times when he pinned Hill against his car.

“Hill acknowledged to detectives that he could have stayed in his car, drove away, and avoided the whole situation,” police said in the charges.

Hill is being held at the Anchorage Correctional Complex.