1 charged after Hampton woman shot, killed in Newport News outside nail salon

A Hampton man was arrested in Suffolk late Thursday night after a 26-year-old woman was shot and killed in broad daylight outside a Newport News shopping plaza, according to police.

In a news conference Friday, Newport News Police Chief Steve Drew said that police responded to reports of a shooting shortly before 5 p.m. When officers arrived they found a woman with multiple gunshot wounds in the parking lot of the Sam's Plaza shopping center, which houses Lucky Nails and Boost Mobile in the 6100 block of Jefferson Avenue, near the intersection with Mercury Boulevard.

She was pronounced dead five minutes after police were dispatched.

Police identified the woman as Jocelyn Miera Frazier of Hampton, Drew said Friday.

Officers arrested Maya Pasquinel Frye, a 41-year-old man who lives in the 2000 block of Cunningham Drive, at a Walmart in Suffolk shortly before midnight on Thursday, according to Drew.

Frye was charged with second-degree murder and using a firearm in a felony. Online jail records show he is being held in the Newport News city jail without bond.

Frazier's sister identified Frye as Frazier's ex-boyfriend, according to a criminal complaint filed Friday in Juvenile and Domestic Relations District Court. Frazier and Frye also had a child together, the documents say.

Drew talked with Frazier's mother and other members of her family before speaking with reporters in the rain Friday in the parking lot where Frazier was killed the day before.

A number of family members came for a prayer circle with police, led by councilwoman and police chaplain Saundra Cherry.

Multiple business owners from the four-store shopping center joined in the prayer circle. Drew said that they, along with other witnesses who had been in the shopping center and surveillance camera footage, were instrumental in quickly identifying a suspect.

"If they had not come forward as quick as they did, there is no doubt that we would not have had this individual identified as quickly as we did and an arrest made," Drew said.

Witnesses said Frazier was inside the Lucky Nail Salon for a manicure. Using surveillance footage, police were able to confirm that a man had been inside the nail salon with Frazier.

The surveillance video later showed Frazier arguing with the man in the parking lot when he punched her and wrestled her to the ground, the complaint said.

Frazier was then shot twice — once in the side of the head, according to the documents. There was a pause followed by a third shot.

This was the third reported homicide in the city this year, Drew said, down from five at this time last year. In all three homicides, police have reported that the victims and suspects have known each other. On March 29, 61-year-old Randall Edward Dotson was shot and killed at a Motel 6 on J. Clyde Morris Boulevard.

Drew emphasized the issue of domestic violence, encouraging those in abusive relationships to reach out and those who might notice something wrong to report it.

Since 1999, 2,459 people in Virginia have been killed in domestic- or partner-related violence, according to an annual report submitted to the General Assembly in January. In 2016, about a third of all homicides in Virginia were attributed to family or intimate partner violence.

"Domestic violence is a real situation that we have got to address, and the police department can't do it on our own," Drew said.

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