Winston-Salem police have charged a fourth man with murder in connection with a New Year's drive-by shooting on Peachtree Street that killed a man and wounded a child inside the home. Deshun Lamont Boston, 33, was already locked up at the Forsyth County Law Enforcement Detention Center on an unrelated November 2024 shooting case when investigators served the new warrants Tuesday.
According to the Winston-Salem Journal, police responded to a reported shooting in the 600 block of Peachtree Street around 11:20 p.m. on January 1, 2025. Officers found a man dead of a fatal gunshot inside the home; the paper's initial report identified him as 36-year-old John Derrick Richards, citing police. Local funeral records instead identify the victim as 54-year-old John Derriman Richards, whose services were held on January 13, 2025, at Emmanuel Baptist Church, according to Hooper Funeral Home & Cremation.
A child inside the home also suffered a non-life-threatening gunshot wound, police told the Journal. As detailed by WFMY News 2, suspects fired multiple rounds from outside into the residence just before midnight, while two adults and four children were present. One child was struck; the other three children and both adults were unharmed, per the same account.
Fourth Arrest Follows Months-Long Manhunt
Boston is the fourth person charged in the case, following the July 2025 arrests of Terros Derone Drayton, Clarence Curtis Graham III, and Henry Montarious Smith. Smith was tracked down in Florida by U.S. Marshals and extradited to North Carolina in August 2025 to face felony murder and firearm charges, the station's report notes. The string of arrests points to a coordinated, multi-agency effort spanning local police, federal marshals, and state authorities over roughly seven months.
Beyond the murder charge, Winston-Salem police charged Boston with assault with a deadly weapon with intent to kill inflicting serious injury, two counts of discharging a weapon into an occupied building, and one count of discharging a weapon into an occupied building inflicting serious injury, according to Star News TV. He was identified as a suspect following an extended, multi-month police investigation, per the outlet. Boston's next court date is scheduled for Wednesday, the Journal reports.
Suspect's Prior Run-Ins With Forsyth County Justice System
Boston has a history in Forsyth County's court system. In June 2021, he was arrested on multiple felony charges including kidnapping, motor vehicle larceny, fleeing to elude arrest with a motor vehicle, and drug possession, according to the Forsyth County Sheriff's Office. That arrest followed a high-speed vehicle pursuit initiated by deputies that ended in a crash, the sheriff's office said.
Boston is being held without bond. Under North Carolina's Pretrial Integrity Act of 2023, magistrates are barred from setting bail for people charged with severe violent felonies such as murder or discharging firearms into occupied property, a shift Hoodline previously reported requires a district court judge to set release conditions within 48 hours of arrest.
What Boston and His Co-Defendants Face in Court
Under North Carolina General Statutes § 14-17, first-degree murder is a Class A felony carrying a mandatory sentence of life imprisonment without parole or the death penalty upon conviction, according to FindLaw. That statute applies both to intentional, premeditated killings and to homicides committed during other violent felonies.
Discharging a firearm into an occupied dwelling is separately classified as a Class D felony carrying up to 63 months in prison under North Carolina General Statutes § 14-34.1, a charge that becomes a Class C felony when the shooting causes serious bodily injury to someone inside, per FindLaw. It remains an open question whether prosecutors intend to try Boston alongside his three co-defendants, what motive investigators believe drove the attack on the Peachtree Street home, and how Boston's pending November 2024 shooting case will factor into his homicide prosecution.
The case comes as Winston-Salem's homicide numbers have leveled off after a spike a few years back. The city recorded 25 homicides in 2024 and 26 in 2025, a marked drop from the 44 homicides reported in 2023, according to the Carolina Journal. In 2025, the city's per-capita homicide rate stood at roughly one homicide per 10,000 residents, putting it on par with Charlotte and neighboring Greensboro, the outlet reported.
