Atlanta Police Department officers went to the scene of the WestMar student housing located at 800 West Marietta Street on Aug. 1, 2024. (FOX 5) (FOX 5 Atlanta)
ATLANTA - An arrest was made Tuesday in a 2024 murder at a West Midtown student housing center.
What we know:
Nahjel Williams, 24, was charged with murder, aggravated assault, and possession of a firearm during the commission of a felony. The arrest comes just over a year and a half after the deadly shooting, which occurred at the WestMar Student Lofts on the 800 block of West Marietta Street on Aug. 1, 2024.
The backstory:
According to the Atlanta Police Department, officers arrived to find a 24-year-old man with an apparent gunshot wound.
Medics pronounced him dead at the scene.
Dig deeper:
Williams has a long arrest history in Cobb and Fulton counties. Just nine days before the deadly shooting, Sandy Springs police arrested Williams on felony theft by conversion. He was released the following day on a non-cash bond pre-trial agreement.
Shortly before that arrest, Fulton County court records show the owners of the apartment, Cardinal Group Investments, had filed a civil dispossessory case for failure to pay rent.
In March 2023, Williams entered a plea deal to resolve four separate cases in Cobb County Superior Court. As part of the agreement, Williams was sentenced in one case while prosecutors granted a nolle prosequi—a formal notice to drop charges—in three others. Those cases included an arrest for aggravated battery and aggravated assault in January 2022 involving a firearm, a battery and unlawful acts in a penal institution in March 2022, and felony drug possession in December 2021.
In August 2020, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported that a Nahjel Malik Williams was arrested for biting a chunk out of a man’s face during an argument about speeding. FOX 5 Atlanta could not find online records regarding the resolution of that case.
What we don't know:
It remains unclear whether Williams was still under court-ordered supervision from his March 2023 Cobb County plea deal when the August 2024 shooting occurred.
Atlanta police have not released a motive for the WestMar Student Lofts shooting or clarified if Williams and the victim were known to one another.
The Source: The article draws from official records provided by the Atlanta Police Department and the Cobb and Fulton County court systems. An Atlanta Journal-Constitution article was also referenced.