Arrest warrants describe days of escalating conflict before gunfire struck four relatives at a DeKalb County apartment complex.

STONE MOUNTAIN, Ga. — A dispute that authorities say began while young people were playing football escalated over several days before an 18-year-old allegedly opened fire during a confrontation at a DeKalb County apartment complex, killing brothers Ja’marion Rolle, 11, and Ja’Khi Clark, 12, and wounding two other relatives, according to police and arrest-warrant details reported by local news organizations.

Julian Ellis was arrested Sept. 22, two days after the Sept. 20 shooting on North Hairston Road, and was charged in connection with both deaths and the injuries to two women. DeKalb County police publicly said Ellis faced two counts of felony murder and six counts of aggravated assault. Some reports citing online jail records listed four aggravated-assault counts with a weapon, creating a discrepancy in the publicly available accounts. The case remained under investigation, and Ellis’ public defender said the evidence and circumstances surrounding the shooting still needed to be fully examined.

The confrontation was not described by investigators as a random encounter. Arrest warrants obtained by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution said the people involved had been playing football together in the days before the shooting. One person whose identity was redacted from records told authorities that a group of juveniles had been bullying him, according to the warrants. The boys’ mother also told police that her family had been involved in a fight Thursday, Sept. 17, with other young people who did not live at the North Hairston Road complex. Those accounts placed an earlier disagreement at the beginning of a chain of events that investigators were still trying to reconstruct.

Three days later, family members were outside at the apartment complex during what the boys’ mother described in television interviews as a barbecue. She told police that a group of girls arrived looking to fight her sons, according to the AJC’s account of an incident report. The group left and later returned. The mother said she then noticed a man she believed was carrying a gun. Items were thrown as the confrontation developed, and the incident report said the dispute grew into a larger fight. Investigators allege Ellis was among those involved when the violence escalated from a physical confrontation to gunfire.

Four members of the same family were struck. Police found Ja’marion with a gunshot wound, and he was pronounced dead at the scene. Ja’Khi was taken to a hospital in critical condition and later died. Police initially reported that two adult women, ages 19 and 39, also were wounded and survived. Police Chief Gregory Padrick later said the older woman was 37. Other reporting identified the wounded relatives as the boys’ aunt and cousin. Authorities did not publicly release detailed medical information about their injuries, and later reporting reviewed for this story did not establish a final recovery status for them.

The physical scene and recorded images became important parts of the investigation. According to the arrest warrants, the shooting was captured on video, and people who were with Ellis identified him as the person with the firearm. The incident report also said investigators found multiple shell casings in the grass and observed bullet damage to a wooden fence and an upstairs window. The boys’ mother told WSB-TV that she provided investigators with video after the people involved fled. Those accounts describe evidence police relied on as they moved from a deadly shooting investigation to an arrest two days later.

Police announced Ellis’ arrest Tuesday night. Authorities said he faced two felony-murder counts along with aggravated-assault charges, although the number of assault counts differed among official statements and jail-record-based reports. CBS Atlanta, Atlanta News First, WSB-TV and Fox 5 Atlanta reported six aggravated-assault counts based on police information. The AJC and Law&Crime reported four counts based on jail or booking records available at different points. The difference could reflect changes in charging records or how the counts were displayed, but the reviewed sources do not establish a definitive explanation. The central allegation remained that Ellis was charged in connection with a shooting that killed both boys and wounded two other relatives.

Ellis appeared in court Sept. 24, according to Atlanta News First. Public defender Daryl Queen was assigned to represent him. Queen cautioned against treating the information released immediately after the shooting as a complete account of the case, saying through the AJC that additional evidence and context needed to be reviewed. The defense also emphasized that Ellis is presumed innocent. No reviewed source established that a trial had occurred or that Ellis had been convicted, and the allegations in the warrants remain allegations that prosecutors would have to prove in court.

The shooting left two schools mourning students at different grade levels. Ja’marion was a fifth grader at Stone Mill Elementary School, while Ja’Khi was a sixth grader at Stone Mountain Middle School, the AJC reported. Principals at both schools told their communities that counselors, psychologists and other support staff would be available. School district leaders said the deaths added to a broader burden carried by students and families when violence involving young people extends into school communities even when the shooting itself happens away from campus.

County officials addressed that broader concern three days after the shooting. DeKalb County CEO Lorraine Cochran-Johnson, police leaders and school officials announced a $250,000 initiative called Education to Empowerment, aimed at students in sixth through 12th grades. Officials said the program would focus on leadership development, emotional intelligence, conflict resolution, behavior regulation and connections to educational and economic opportunities. They said the initiative had been under development for about a year and was not created specifically because of the deaths of Ja’marion and Ja’Khi, although the shooting gave the announcement new urgency.

The county’s response did not resolve the central unanswered questions in the criminal investigation. Police Chief Padrick said investigators would continue following the evidence and would take action if it pointed to additional people who were responsible. The warrants described a group arriving at the complex and multiple people taking part in the confrontation, but the reviewed reporting did not establish that anyone beyond Ellis had been charged in the fatal shooting. Authorities also had not publicly provided a complete minute-by-minute account explaining how each participant became involved or what happened immediately before the first shot was fired.

As of the most recent reporting located for this story, Ellis remained the person publicly charged in the deaths of the two brothers, while investigators continued examining the shooting and the events that preceded it. Later public reporting reviewed through Nov. 8 did not establish a conviction or final resolution of the criminal case. The differing public accounts of the aggravated-assault counts also underscore that charging records can change as a case develops and should not be treated as final until confirmed in current court filings.

Author note: Last updated Nov. 8, 2026.