Suspect in December shooting arraigned

The man arrested for the December shooting on Ashley Forest Drive will be arraigned Monday.

Mario Dante Ramsey, 26, of Durham, faces first-degree murder charges for the death of Drew C. Frasure, 41, of Chapel Hill. The search for Frasure’s killer generated a racial profiling complaint against the Chapel Hill Police Department by a UNC student.

The shooting

Twenty minutes after midnight on Dec. 11, a woman called the Chapel Hill Police Department to report the shooting of a man later identified as Frasure. She said he had been shot in his neck and was bleeding badly.

She also told the 911 operator that she saw three white men leave his apartment.

Frasure later died of his injuries at the scene.

According to a police press release sent out following the slaying, Frasure is believed to have known his shooter.

Four days later, police arrested Ramsey for the shooting.

Although the 911 call mentioned three men, Chapel Hill police declined to comment on whether they are seeking other suspects. Lt. Kevin Gunter, a department spokesman, said additional arrests will be announced via press release.

Frasure was buried Dec. 16.

He was the father of two — Amelia Frances Dennis Frasure of Kill Devil Hills and Sean Christopher Frasure of High Point, according to his Richard and Thompson funeral home obituary.

The obituary states that Frasure was a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Chapel Hill, where he served as an usher, and a member of the Tar Heel Fan Club.

Racial profiling complaint

While searching for the man who shot Frasure, Chapel Hill police pulled over UNC junior Cameron Horne — a black student who says he was racially profiled.

Thirty minutes after the shooting was reported, Horne was driving to pick up a friend from the Timber Hollow Apartments, a short distance from Ashley Forest Drive.

He said three or four squad cars pulled him over, and three white officers ordered him from his car at gunpoint. He said he was then ordered to lie on the ground while a fourth white officer handcuffed him. After officers pulled him from the ground and he produced his One Card, he said the tone of the stop changed and police released him.

“He said, ‘Sorry man, but you know that’s how it goes,’” Horne recalled. “I won’t forget that one.”

Horne filed a racial profiling complaint with the Chapel Hill Police Department the next day. He said police told him they had been looking for three black men in a gold car.

Horne said he was driving alone in a blue car. In the wake of the incident, Horne sought a formal apology from the department.

Chapel Hill Police Chief Chris Blue spoke with Horne in the Student Union Dec. 15, but declined to comment on what the two discussed.

“It’s going through our normal complaints process,” he said.

Horne said Blue explained to him that the officers had acted according to department policy. Horne said Blue was sympathetic to the slight Horne felt.

In the weeks after the incident, the department released two radio recordings from the night of the shooting which show that police had difficulty nailing down a subject description.

Frasure’s family criticized Horne’s complaint after it was publicized in The Daily Tar Heel. Frasure’s sister, Stephanie Openshaw, sent an email signed by other family members thanking the police for making an arrest in the murder case and asking Horne to reconsider.

“Cameron is playing the victim in this, he doesn’t GET to play the victim, we buried the victim Friday,” she wrote.

Horne said he would still proceed with the complaint.

“If I was that family,” he said, “I would want to find (the shooter) too, but I wouldn’t want anyone to be humiliated over that.”

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