He was a skilled athlete in high school, winning a championship ring in track and playing defensive end for the football team.
“I didn’t miss a game,” his mother, Shirley “Shunte” Jones, told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
Marsiah Collins also could sing and rap and earned good grades, his mother said. He graduated in 2022 from Opelika High School in Alabama, planned to attend Georgia State University and was considering a career in engineering, Jones said.
Late Saturday, she got a phone call that changed everything.
She was told to get to Dadeville, about 45 minutes away from her home. Hours later, she learned Marsiah, 19, had been one of four people killed when shots were fired during a “Sweet 16″ birthday party. At least 28 others were injured in the shooting, according to investigators.
“Marsiah was an innocent bystander,” Jones said.
Philstavious “Phil” Dowdell, 18; Keke Nicole Smith, 17; and Corbin Dahmontrey Holston, 23, were also killed in the shooting, which remains under investigation.
On Wednesday, the Alabama Law Enforcement Agency announced two arrests. Ty Reik McCullough, 17, and Travis McCullough, 16, both of Tuskegee, were each charged with four counts of reckless murder.
Shell casings from handguns were recovered at the scene and there’s no evidence a high-powered rifle was used, investigators said. They’ve repeatedly appealed for information from the public.
Jones had talked with her son about avoiding conflicts.
“Watch your surroundings,” Jones would tell him. “Watch your friends.”
Marsiah had followed his mother’s advice. He had many friends and was the life of the party, Jones said.
“To have someone take my child’s life from me, I don’t have the words to say what I want to say,” Jones said.
Marsiah’s father, Martin Collins, who lives in Louisiana, said his son had also considered Louisiana State University.
“We need comprehensive legislation or reform,” Collins told Channel 2 Action News. “We may need to take it to a constitutional level and clarify the 2nd Amendment. We need to do something. How many times are we going to keep burying our children?”
On Monday night, Jones spoke at a candlelight vigil in Opelika for the shooting victims.
“The last thing I would want any parent out here to do is to be burying their child,” Jones said, according to the Opelika-Auburn News. “That pain that I’m feeling, I hope y’all don’t ever have to feel what me and my family is feeling.”
Funeral plans were to be finalized Wednesday, the family said. Through her tears, Jones said she’s grateful for those beside her since losing her son.
“I just thank everyone that has been messaging me, calling me. My community,” she said. “I have the best support system I could ever ask for.”
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