By Elizabeth Ferszt
Contributing Writer
Dion Jamel Flowers Jr., 29, Montez White, 27, and Tyrek Rice, 26, co-defendants in the murder case of Anthony Owens Jr., were in 12th District Court for a preliminary exam March 31 in front of Hon. Allison Bates. They are each charged with open murder, three counts of assault with intent to murder and at least one firearm offense.
The shooting happened May 16, 2025, in Summit Township. Owens was shot and killed, and Randall Hurst, Kenneth Avant, and Michael Gant were injured.
Emotional testimony was heard from several key witnesses for the prosecution, including Gracia Gant, Hurst, and Avant. The preliminary exam will continue April 6 because not all witnesses were available to testify.
Chief Assistant Prosecutor, Nathan Hull, first called Gracia Gant, who approached the witness stand using a walker. After she was sworn in, Hull asked her how she knew Owens. “He was my boyfriend,” she said, and started to sob.
Gant said she and several members of her family: her mom, Karen Gant; her daughter; her brothers, including Michael; and Owens were sitting on her front porch, enjoying the warm weather.
Gant said she left the porch to go inside to use the bathroom. “Then I washed my hands and started back out toward the porch. I heard shots, pop pop pop pop,” she said. “Immediately, upon hearing it, I knew it was gunfire.”
The front door was open — she could see the hallway toward the porch. Hull asked her if she saw Owens. “No, he never made it inside — I didn’t get to see Tony — the police would not let me.”
Gant said she saw Hurst crawling into the front hallway, “He was shot so many times.”
Hull asked how much time it took for police to get there — Gant said “it seemed like it took forever for the police to get there; so many people were calling them. It took them forever,” she repeated through tears. “So much blood was outside. It took the police forever,” Gant said.
On cross examination, Alfred Brandt, attorney for Flowers, asked Gant to clarify if she went to Henry Ford Hospital that night. “When you got there, whom did you see,” Brandt asked. Gant said she only saw the family of Owens, but none of the shooting victims. “I stayed there until they pronounced Tony dead,” she said, weeping. “We were in shock. It was going on the next day (May 17).”
David Carter, attorney for Rice, tried to get Gant to clarify what she did or did not hear that night. “I just heard shooting; there was also music playing, so I did not hear any voices,” she said.
Adam Clements, attorney for White, asked Gant about seeing any of the guests at her house with firearms or a vehicle speeding away? “No,” she replied.
Hurst described his version of what happened that night. After he got off work at American 1 Credit Union around 7:30 p.m., he got a ride to Tate’s Party Store which is immediately across from Lincoln Court where the shootings took place. He was invited to go over to Gant’s house at 103 Lincoln Ct. to chill with friends and enjoy the spring weather. Hurst said he bought a Red Bull from the store, “because I don’t drink…and rolled me a blunt because I smoke weed” — he just sat on porch and talked. “There was a lot of people on the porch,” Hurst said.
“At some point, does the gathering dwindle?” asked Assistant Prosecutor Heidi Lindenmuth.
“Yes, between about 10 p.m. and midnight,” said Hurst. He said he had just sent a text to his girlfriend when, “Out of the corner of my eye, I see some people coming in black —I saw 2-3 people in a line, they start shooting, one maybe come from the back of the house.”
Hurst said they were wearing black hoodies, black pants, and black masks. He said saw a gun, but not long enough to scrutinize it for type or caliber, before the shooting began. He was shot eight times, bullets entering his side, legs, and right foot. When the shooting started, he launched himself into the doorway of the house, where Gracia Gant saw him lying there badly wounded in the hallway.
When asked if anyone on that porch had any weapons, Hurst said no. “Everyone was screaming, going ballistic (after the shooting started) — I was actually the one to call the police and try to calm everyone down.”
“I see Tony, Block (Avant), and Mike all laying on top of each other.” Hurst added, “I saw the chair that I was sitting in knocked down, and blood everywhere.”
Hurst said he spent three weeks in the hospital, and has had five surgeries, and is still doing PT and other treatments like counseling.
Hurst added, when the fire department placed a tourniquet on his leg and he “was carried in a sheet to the ambulance” — they told him, “believe it or not you are in better shape than all the others here.”
On cross-exam, attorney Brandt tried to get Hurst to make a distinction between potential types of guns used and the distinct sounds of those gunshots. “I heard multiple guns,” Hurst said, but he could not tell if they were a single shot vs. automatic types of weapons. “They aimed at the house; there was multiple guns being used,” he said.
Attorney Carter also tried to gain clarification on what guns Hurst saw and/or heard. But Hurst stated that he was “no gun expert.”
The third witness, Avant, said he was at Gracia Gant’s house that night because his fiancée, Donna Brown, is Gant’s first cousin.
Avant described how all of the sudden, he heard gunshots, and “seen Randall fall back into the doorway, and he said, ‘Watch out!’”
Then he looked over the porch railing and “I see three guys, and one of them shot me in the head; it went through my neck,” Avant said. “Donna got a towel and wrapped it around my head,” he added, pausing to collect himself.
“When I jumped back, that’s what left Tony open.” Avant said they (Owens, Hurst, and Michael Gant) were lying in a pile on the porch.
“It all happened so fast, but I did not pass out. I also don’t know how I got shot in the leg,” Avant added. He described the shooters as one having “a hoodie, but the other two had masks on” — and that while he did not see a gun, he saw “a muzzle flash go off when I got shot…I didn’t even see a gun — I just saw a flash — you know a boom.”
Avant was first taken to Henry Ford Hospital, but was quickly transferred to University of Michigan Hospital in Ann Arbor, where he stayed for about 34 days.
Avant’s testimony was consistent with Hurst’s and Gant’s.
Still to testify are JCSO Detective Kelly Ebersole and Dr. Bernardino Pacris, M.D.
