A Memphis man was indicted for premeditated first-degree murder after kidnapping a man from a wheelchair at gunpoint, shooting him to death and dumping his body in a field, according to Shelby County District Attorney Amy Weirich.
Jerome Nichols, 24, and another man kidnapped 41-year-old Ramarreao Prince Akins outside of a grocery store on Horn Lake Road on August 12, 2021, Weirich said.
Akins, who had both his legs amputated, was in a wheelchair. Weirich said that Nichols and the other man punched and slapped Akins and then took him from his wheelchair at gunpoint and put him in a green Saturn SUV. Surveillance video shows them driving away from the grocery store in the Saturn, leaving the wheelchair behind, Weirich said.
Two days later, a father and son were out riding four-wheelers in a field in the 2000 block of West Shelby Drive when they found Akins’s body, according to Weirich.
The medical examiner said that Akins was shot more than six times.
A month later, Nichols was arrested for Akins’s murder. Authorities are still trying to identify the second man involved.
If you have any information about that man, the Shelby County District Attorney’s Office urges you to call Crime Stoppers at 901-528-CASH. Any information that leads to his arrest could be worth up to $2,000.
Nichols has been indicted on counts of premeditated first-degree murder, first-degree murder in the perpetration of a kidnapping, especially aggravated kidnapping with a deadly weapon and especially aggravated robbery resulting in serious bodily injury.
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