Man faces charges in July 1 Canton shooting death

CANTON — Police continue to search for suspects after they arrested one juvenile in connection to a July 1 drive-by shooting that killed a teen from Texas who was visiting his grandmother.

Cordarious Dontravious Johnson, 15, was arrested and charged with murder. Johnson has been booked into the Madison County Detention Center.

Canton Police Chief Otha Brown said he expects further arrests to come as the investigation continues.

“We are looking to get some answers out of him,” Brown said. “This is an ongoing investigation.”

Brown said they do not know if Johnson was the gunman and are trying to identify other suspects involved.

Brown said they had not identified a motive as of Tuesday afternoon. He said they do not know if the two knew each other.

Johnson is one of the suspects in the Thursday, July 1, shooting on north West Street in Canton that killed Demarian Tillman, 15, of Texas. Tillman was in town visiting his grandmother, Brown said.

Police received the call at about 11:30 p.m. of gunshots ringing out in the 300 block of north West Street not far from Canton’s Fire Station No. 3 on the north side of Peace Street west of the railroad Brown said.

When officers arrived, Brown said they found Tillman dead at the scene. Brown said Tillman had been in town a week and a couple of days.

Brown said the killing was the second homicide in Canton this year.

On May 7, the bloodied body of a 37-year-old woman named Takoria Brown was found at the Econo Lodge on Soldiers Colony Road.

That murder is under investigation by the Mississippi Bureau of Investigation.

In 2020, there were eight homicides reported in Canton in what Brown called a particularly violent year. That included the triple homicide of a Guatemalan family.