Murder, other charges certified to grand jury
Published 7:50 pm Friday, August 12, 2022
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Charges against a Suffolk man in the death of a Chesapeake woman, including second-degree murder, were certified to the grand jury Thursday in Suffolk General District Court.
Phillip Jovan Etheridge, 24, has been charged with second-degree murder, two counts of felony assault, two counts of shooting or throwing missiles at an occupied vehicle, discharging a firearm in or around a school, attempting to commit a non-capital offense, two counts of conspiracy to commit a felony and the use or display of a firearm in the commission of a felony.
Etheridge is currently being held in Western Tidewater Regional Jail.
The charges are in connection with the March 27 shooting that killed Tameisha Goode-Rogers, 40, while another man, Reginald Ashmead Thorne III, 36 at the time of the shooting and who had been with her at the time, had been hospitalized.
Thorne, according to a criminal complaint, advised a dispatcher that two people with guns approached their vehicle, a Nissan Rogue, then left in a blue truck displaying out-of-state tags.
Police responded to the side entrance to The Cove Veterinarian Hospital at 6550 Hampton Roads Pkwy. from Respass Beach Road, where they saw Rogers’ and Thorne’s vehicle. Rogers, according to the criminal complaint, was in the driver’s seat and “was unresponsive, had agonal breathing and no pulse.”
Rogers was pronounced dead at the scene.
The day after the shooting, police encountered Etheridge while canvassing Townsend Place, where the shooting victims had been before the shooting, according to the complaint, and Etheridge provided information to police about the shooting and what he saw happen.
Etheridge came to police headquarters March 29 and gave a recorded statement, the complaint states. Before the shooting, Etheridge admitted to calling the four other co-conspirators to come to his location, and also, according to the complaint, admitted to driving his vehicle, which was used by the co-conspirators to shoot from while they went after the victim’s vehicle.
Ethridge, the complaint states, identified someone he knew as the shooter, and he was told by that person to follow the victim’s vehicle. Etheridge told police that while traveling down Respass Beach Road, according to the complaint, the shooter had an assault-style weapon and fired several times at the victim’s vehicle while hanging out of the passenger side window.
At the time shots were fired, Etheridge’s vehicle was within 10 feet of a city public school.
While the complaint does not name the school, the only city public school on Respass Beach Road is Northern Shores Elementary School.
Etheridge, according to the complaint, said he then left the area and on the next day, he and the person he identified as the shooter bought cleaning supplies and took his vehicle to be thoroughly cleaned to remove any evidence.