Monday, 27 July 2026, 23:47
A mistrial was declared Tuesday in the trial of two men accused in Sacramento's 2022 K Street mass shooting after jurors failed to reach a verdict. The Sacramento County District Attorney's Office said prosecutors will soon decide whether to retry Dandrae Martin and Mtula Payton.
The trial, which lasted more than two months, featured dozens of hours of surveillance footage and testimony from responding officers and witnesses.
"Unfortunately, the jury was unable to reach a verdict, and a mistrial has been declared," the DA's office said in a statement. "We will make a decision in the near future as to our next steps, which will include a decision to retry the case." The office declined further comment because the case remains pending.
Jurors had previously deadlocked on first-degree murder charges before continuing deliberations on lesser second-degree murder charges. Martin and Payton face multiple murder and weapons counts tied to the shooting, which killed six people and injured 12 others. The trial began in April 2026, with jury deliberations starting earlier this month. Both men faced charges including three counts of murder. However, media outlets reported the Sacramento County District Attorney's Office dismissed the first-degree murder charges last week after the jury was unable to reach a unanimous decision. Prosecutors elected to move forward with second-degree murder charges instead. KCRA reports the two men were convicted on weapons charges for being felons in possession of firearms.
If convicted, they faced up to 15 years to life in prison.
Defense attorney Linda Parisi argued in court this was no gang shooting but an act of self-defense by defendants Martin and Payton. "I am really impressed with this jury," Parisi said. "This is a difficult case. It's got a lot of emotion to it. It happens right in our community, right downtown where we care about what's happening. And they were very committed to going through the evidence and diligently working and then ultimately had the courage of their convictions."
Defense attorney Reid Kingsbury also argued on behalf of the defendants alongside Parisi.
Leia Schenk, a Sacramento activist and founder of Empact, held a news conference outside the courthouse with the victims' families immediately following Tuesday's decision. "This has been a long and painful, traumatizing four years. What took place in the early morning of April 3, 2022, to some of you may be described as a horrific act of gun violence, but to these families, it was the worst day of their lives," she said.
"Whether you're Black or white or Hispanic, it doesn't matter; you have the right to go [to] downtown Sacramento, the capital, and enjoy yourself without the fear of violence," said John Alexander, father of 21-year-old victim Johntaya Alexander. Johntezha Alexander, Johntaya's sister, who was also on K Street the night of the shooting, said she put herself through the long and hard process of a trial with the hope of accountability. "Those defendants get to walk away today with something I don't get to walk away with and that is hope," she said. "Hope that they will see the sun again, hope that they will breathe air again, hope that they will be free. Their families get that hope." "I don't have that hope; my hope is six feet in the ground," Alexander added.
Families of the victims sounded off against the decision, saying they're grieving all over again. The sister of murder victim Jontae Alexander described her pain outside the Sacramento courthouse. "I had my best friend ripped from me," Johntezha Alexander said. "I had my heart ripped out of my chest, and there was nothing I could do about it."
The shooting occurred near 10th and K streets in downtown Sacramento, a busy entertainment district. The incident prompted increased security measures and community calls for action on gun violence. The trial was closely watched in Sacramento County and across California.
Sacramento civic leaders are grappling with what comes next after the mistrial, with many saying the lack of a verdict leaves victims' families and the community without closure. "We need a verdict," Sacramento City Councilmember Phil Pluckebaum said. Pluckebaum, whose district includes Downtown Sacramento, said the 2022 K Street mass shooting continues to shape public perceptions of safety more than three years after the tragedy. "The families are looking for justice. They're looking for closure," Pluckebaum said. "You heard the victims' families talking about wanting to move on." In the aftermath of the shooting, city leaders made a series of changes aimed at improving downtown safety, including installing more surveillance cameras, increasing police patrols, expanding violence prevention funding and creating a city nightlife manager position. But not everyone believes those efforts have gone far enough. "I just don't think we hit the mark. We're still in a very, very negative place," said gun violence prevention advocate Berry Accius, who was downtown the night of the shooting. Accius said he expects prosecutors to move forward with another trial. "This is definitely a kick in the stomach for the district attorney," he said. "With such a high-profile case, you want to hit a home run. At this particular time, you didn't even get on first base." Mark Reichel is a defense attorney not connected to the case, who says if the D.A. retries the case, there likely will be new evidence included. "They're going to try to change things up," Reichel said. "Usually, both sides do a little better job the second time around." "I wasn't surprised to see this the hung jury and here's why. Those bullets flew really fast. Things take place really fast in the crime scene, but when you come to the courtroom, you slow everything down." For many in Sacramento, the mistrial has reopened wounds from one of the city's deadliest mass shootings while raising new questions about accountability and the path forward. "We need a verdict to close that chapter and move on," Pluckebaum said. "And that verdict absolutely needs to be satisfactory to the families." Sacramento police are already talking to the DA's office about next steps in filing new charges. The next court date is set for October 3.
The April 3, 2022, shooting was the deadliest mass shooting in Sacramento history. The incident occurred in the early morning hours as bars and clubs were closing, drawing national attention to gun violence in the state capital. In the early morning hours of April 3, 2022, the sound of rapid gunshots from multiple directions broke through the rumblings of hundreds of people pouring out of bars and clubs that line K Street in Sacramento. Milling toward parked cars and ride-shares quickly turned into sprinting and ducking as people ran for their lives and tried to shield themselves from bullets.
While they were not convicted for the deaths, they were found guilty of being in possession of firearms despite having prior felonies.
Initially, the pair were charged with first-degree murder, but prosecutors later downgraded the charges to second-degree murder after the jurors found themselves deadlocked, the Sacramento Bee reported.
"Ultimately, justice would be to have their loved ones back. But there's no such thing as justice in a case like this," Schenk said in a post-verdict press conference outside the courthouse. "Now we're starting all over again. So the families can't begin to heal because every time they come here it's ripping the Band-Aid off." If a new trial were to begin, Schenk added that she hoped to see the district attorney's office offer compensation for the time the victims' families had to take from work and money spent on gas as they commuted to and from court.
Taking place just blocks from the state's capitol, the 2022 shooting rocked Sacramento. And it was one of the few events of its kind that was the subject of a major trial. Gang-related shootings rarely command sustained attention, said Leia Schenk, a victims' advocate in Sacramento, who is supporting three of families who lost loved ones. But the shooting's lethality, and its high-profile location, meant it attracted media from all over the world, she said.
By the end of the chaotic scene, six people were dead. Three were women who were bystanders: Johntaya Alexander, 21; Melinda Davis, 57; Yamile Martinez-Andrade, 21. The others were three men who were later alleged to have been a part of the conflict that led to the melee: Sergio Harris, 38; Joshua Hoye-Lucchesi, 32; and DeVazia Turner, 29.
Martin and his brother Smiley Martin were arrested days after the shooting, and Payton was found by police in Las Vegas and arrested in late May 2022. All three were charged with murder. In 2024, Smiley Martin was found dead in his cell at the Sacramento county main jail from a methadone overdose, a coroner later determined.
As the investigation continued, investigators argued that the shooting was the result of a conflict between rival groups that climaxed with the shooting. Prosecutors argued that Martin and Payton went to K Street to kill their rivals, while the defense argued that the pair fired shots in self-defense and out of fear from the unexpected bursts of gunfire. And while the pair were both armed that night, their defense argued that neither planned to shoot anyone nor were looking to settle any gang conflict.
During the trial, Payton testified about his life as a member of a local gang, which he joined when he was 11, and claimed that he was afraid for his life at the time of the shooting. "Everybody was running in the same direction as me. People were getting shot around me. I was scared," Payton told his attorney during his testimony. Martin claimed that he was never affiliated with a gang, but that his deceased brother was.
Since opening arguments in the trial began in late April, there have been scores of witnesses testifying to what they saw the night of the shooting and tense moments in and outside of the courtroom as the families of the victims showed surveillance footage of people firing guns while bystanders ran for cover. The jury also took a two-week break in early July, adding to the protracted nature of this trial, which made the process of grieving that much harder for the families of the deceased, Schenk said.
The mistrial leaves the families of the victims and the community awaiting the DA's decision on whether to retry the case. The outcome underscores the challenges of prosecuting complex mass shooting cases. EMPACT founder Leia Schenk said the court is expected to pick up the case again in October.
