FREEPORT — Freeport Police have announced an arrest and murder charges related to a fatal shooting in that city in early 2024.

The defendant is Demetries Winston, 35, of Freeport. He was served earlier this week with a three-count felony warrant and complaint for two counts of first-degree murder and one count of aggravated discharge of a firearm stemming from the Jan. 13 homicide.

That is when — in the early morning hours, just after 2:25 a.m. — Freeport Police responded to a house in the 1100 Block of S. Oak Avenue for a reported shooting incident. 

“Upon arrival, officers found an unresponsive 41-year-old male victim who had been shot,” said a Freeport police statement. “The victim was transported to the FHN Hospital by Freeport Fire Ambulance where he was pronounced dead.”

At the time of the warrant service, police said, Winston was held in Stephenson County Jail on an unrelated felony charge of unlawful use of a weapon by a felon. Winston, authorities said, was served with the warrant and left in the custody of the jail. He was scheduled for a Friday, June 14 detention hearing, after the newspaper had gone to press, according to court records.

Winston has a lengthy criminal history in Stephenson County, including a conviction for felony aggravated battery to a pregnant/handicapped person in 2022 and felony possession of a controlled substance in 2021, court records indicate. He also was convicted of felony theft in Stephenson County in 2011.

— Gary Mays