A Birmingham man already facing capital murder charges alongside accused mass shooter Damien McDaniel is now staring down a federal gun case as well. Lorenzo Marquise Wiley Jr., 31, faces a federal charge of possessing a firearm as a felon, stemming from an October 2024 search of his home that investigators say was tied to the probe into the Five Points South mass shooting.
According to WBRC 6 News, officers who searched Wiley's home found a Glock .357 SIG pistol in a bedroom closet and roughly 524 grams of marijuana, according to a criminal complaint. Wiley claimed the pistol as his own, per federal records cited in that report. A federal agent cited a DEA investigation into a drug trafficking organization believed responsible for violence across the Birmingham metro area, and said in an affidavit that Wiley was involved in multiple shootings during 2023 and 2024.
That homicide was the killing of 52-year-old Reginald Bryant, who died on November 27, 2023, on Closhire Lane in Birmingham's North Pratt neighborhood. Birmingham police said the killing appeared targeted, and phone and DNA evidence tied both men to shell casings found at the scene. Wiley and McDaniel were both charged with capital murder in Bryant's death in May 2025, and Wiley has pleaded not guilty.
A Split Sentence Unravels
At the time of the October 2024 search, Wiley was serving a split sentence through Jefferson County Community Corrections tied to an August 2024 drug conviction, per the same account. Prosecutors moved later that month to revoke his community corrections status, citing the new marijuana charge and the firearm he claimed as his own. They later filed an amended motion adding a hindering-prosecution charge.
A judge revoked Wiley's community corrections status in June 2025 and ordered him to serve the remainder of his 48-month sentence in state prison, the report notes. Wiley remains in state custody, and his attorney has asked a judge to hold him in the Jefferson County jail, citing safety concerns and the need for access to prepare his case. Earlier this month, a judge denied that request.
The Federal Angle on a Deadly Network
Wiley faces a federal charge of possessing a firearm as a felon, in addition to state capital murder charges.
Federal statistics from the United States Sentencing Commission for fiscal year 2025 show the Northern District of Alabama, which encompasses Birmingham, appeared among the districts with the highest proportion of cases involving § 922(g), with felon-in-possession cases making up 33 percent of its total federal criminal caseload, per the United States Sentencing Commission. Wiley faces both state capital murder charges and a federal gun charge.
McDaniel's Sprawling Capital Murder Case
Wiley's case is bound tightly to that of Damien McDaniel, who has been indicted on nearly 50 counts spanning two separate mass shootings — at Hush Lounge and Trendsetters Lounge — along with other homicides, per WBRC's reporting. Jefferson County District Attorney Danny Carr announced in February 2025 that prosecutors are seeking the death penalty against McDaniel, who faces indictments tied to 18 homicides and more than 30 injuries across central Alabama between 2023 and 2024, according to Yellowhammer News.
McDaniel's record includes a troubling detail: he was sentenced in April 2023 to 15 years in prison after pleading guilty to two 2019 attempted murder charges, but a judge suspended 13 years of that sentence, allowing his release before the alleged 2023-2024 killing spree began. Councilor Hunter Williams criticized the early-release deal, Yellowhammer News reported.
The September 21, 2024 Hush Lounge shooting in Five Points South killed four victims — Anitra Holloman, 21; Tahj Booker, 27; Carlos McCain, 27; and Roderick Patterson Jr., 26 — and injured 17 others when multiple gunmen fired more than 100 rounds into a waiting queue, according to the Associated Press. Two months earlier, a July 13, 2024 drive-by shooting outside Trendsetters Lounge left four people dead and 10 injured, an attack for which McDaniel and co-defendant Hatarius Woods were indicted for capital murder.
Surveillance footage and call logs cited in court filings indicate McDaniel made multiple phone calls to Wiley on September 23, 2024, two days after the Hush Lounge shooting. Wiley covered a vehicle that was later recovered from a Fairfield residence.
A City Still Reeling
Birmingham saw multiple shootings in 2024. A gag order remains in place barring attorneys and accused people from public comment on the Wiley and McDaniel cases and related prosecutions.
The conspiracy tied to McDaniel has continued to widen. Hoodline previously reported that a Jefferson County grand jury indicted 22-year-old Aaron Orlando Jones-Turpin on October 2 as a fourth co-defendant charged with capital murder and 17 counts of assault in the Hush Lounge shooting, joining McDaniel, NyQuan Lollar, and Crishawn McLemore-Bruce. Jones-Turpin was apprehended in DeKalb County in September 2026.
