CMPD said a killing was “justified.” His family wants to know who shot, and why
Charlotte-Mecklenburg police have said little about the fatal shooting of 35-year-old Rogerick Llevon Currie in west Charlotte on Sept. 7.
The few details released include:
The shooting occurred at 1:15 a.m. in the 4000 block of Queen City Drive.
No one would be charged.
And Currie’s homicide, outside of one of Charlotte’s oldest gay bars, was “justified.”
But police won’t say what led to the shooting that night or even who shot Currie. They wouldn’t even tell his mother.
Friends and family said in interviews with The Charlotte Observer that the lack of information has left them confused and frustrated — especially his mother, Carolyn King, and sister, Melissa Currie. When they asked CMPD who shot and killed their loved one, police told them to file a petition in court, they said. They’re in the process of doing that but wondered why police wouldn’t tell them much.
Family members said conversations with police about the night’s events didn’t add up after they spoke with Currie’s friends who were with him.
The friends told his family he didn’t appear to be the aggressor in his interaction with the shooter. He chatted with him for a few minutes before the shooting and seemed to be in a good mood.
His family said he was never known to get physical with anyone. He was more likely to walk away from a fight than engage in one, they said.
They also said Currie not only didn’t own a gun, but had no interest in owning one.
So, they all wondered, what exactly did Currie do for the police to justify his killing?
Making plans for the next day
Currie wasn’t far removed from a solo trip to El Salvador when he was shot.
“He came back so much more at peace,” his sister said. “I could tell this was a spiritual journey for him.”
The day of the shooting, he told family and friends about his plans to attend church the next day and go through his closet to pick out clothes to donate. Earlier in the day he was confirming plans with Jamil Brown over the phone.
Brown said he and Currie were sometimes on and off romantically, but remained friends. Currie “radiated love” for everyone. They planned to watch the second season of “Wednesday” on Netflix, Brown said.
But the night before all of that, Currie had plans to go to dinner and go bar hopping with friends, including Leo Griffin.
Griffin, who met Currie a few years ago, said the pair bonded over singing karaoke and long, emotional conversations.
Griffin found Currie’s death traumatizing, he said. Not only because he lost his friend who he would sing “How Many Ways” by Toni Braxton with at karaoke, but because he was the friend who tried to save Currie the night he was shot.
The night of the shooting
After getting dinner and going to a few bars, he, Currie and their group of friends decided to end the night at the Woodshed Bar on Queen City Drive. The group drove separately, with Currie arriving first and alone. He parked along the road down the street from the bar, Griffin said.
Some of his friends arrived shortly after in another vehicle. Griffin said the friends told him they watched Currie and the shooter talking at the shooter’s car. The friends told Griffin they weren’t concerned because nothing appeared wrong. In fact, they told Griffin, they assumed Currie was getting along with the man.
The man and Currie spoke for a few minutes before the friends waiting in their car told Griffin they heard what they thought were firecrackers. Currie fell to the ground and that’s when the friends called Griffin.
Griffin said he was about a minute away when he got the call. When he got to the road and found Currie on the ground bleeding, he found out no one had called 911, Griffin said.
Confused, Griffin tried to piece together what happened. He looked around for a wound and thought he found it was coming from Currie’s head. He grabbed a T-shirt and applied pressure to stop the bleeding and called 911.
Griffin started talking to Currie while trying to keep his friend alive. Currie couldn’t respond, but his eyes were open and moving a bit, Griffin said.
At the same time, a man in a car near Currie was asking Griffin to move his friend since he was blocking his vehicle. Griffin said he yelled back that moving Currie could make things worse. The man asking him to move Currie was the shooter, Griffin said.
Eventually an ambulance arrived and took Currie to the hospital. Griffin followed in his car and waited several hours with some of Currie’s family, hoping to get updates about his friend’s condition. About 6 a.m., he learned Currie died.
What police told Currie’s family
Melissa Currie and her mom, Carolyn King, were in Fayetteville when the shooting occurred. All of King’s kids — Rogerick, Melissa and their older sister Victoria — were born and raised in Fayetteville.
She was asleep when Melissa called. That same night they started driving to Charlotte. King said she was worried, but expected she would only need to be there to help him through his recovery.
However, as their drive went on, King said, she began to suspect the worst. She called the hospital for answers, she said, but couldn’t give a clear answer about his condition. When they finally learned Currie died, they were devastated, Melissa Currie said.
“It was very traumatizing,” she said. “I’m still in denial of the whole situation.”
That same day, they met with a homicide detective and learned CMPD’s version of the night’s events, King said.
“She said, ‘Oh yes, they tell me that he got the best of Rogerick,’” King said. She said she was confused by the detective’s phrasing.
Melissa Currie said the detective was told by the shooter that her brother got out of his car, went to the shooter’s car and began yelling at him. The shooter shot in self-defense, she and her mother said police told them.
Currie and King said police told them they didn’t find a gun near Rogerick Currie or in his car.
CMPD did not respond to an interview request about the investigation and conversation with family.
For family and friends, answers won’t be enough, they said. They also want to see his shooter — a man whose identity remains a secret — to be charged and stand trial.
And without the answers they want from the police, Currie’s family and friends instead cling to their memories with him and grieve in a new world without him.
A genuine, loving person
Currie was Carolyn King’s second child. She raised all of her kids on her own while working in the dining facilities at Fort Bragg.
Being a single parent came with challenges, King said, and her children didn’t always have the easiest childhoods, but Currie still excelled socially and academically. The full scope of Currie’s achievements became clear at his high school graduation, King said.
“I was with my sister. They were announcing this kid with all these awards, going on and on, and I was like, ‘Who are they talking about?’ And she was like, ‘They’re talking about your son,’” King said. She said she was very proud of him.
Currie was also his family’s biggest cheerleader, King and Melissa Currie said. He cared about supporting people and pushing them to accomplish their dreams.
“He always wanted better for me,” Melissa Currie said.
Rogerick Currie went on to study at Claflin University in South Carolina, where he was in the honors college. He moved to Charlotte around 2015 for job opportunities, Melissa Currie said.
He found a job he was passionate about, a church to attend, and places to volunteer and mentor kids. He graduated with a master’s degree from Johnson C. Smith University and made new friends.
At Claflin University, Currie met one of his closest friends, and eventual future Charlotte roommate in Rye Iyawe
“He was intertwined with everything in my life,” Iyawe said. “He was just a brilliant, nice, genuine, loving person.”
Iyawe said she and Currie became each other’s chosen family. She was a Philadelphia native: they leaned on each other when they couldn’t be with family during the holidays.
With encouragement from Currie, Iyawe moved to Charlotte. Their lives would become even more intertwined as they would work at the same company, move into the same apartment, and adopt dogs together, she said. And even when they stopped being roommates, they were still next door neighbors. He was a groomsman in her wedding, she said, and eventually would have been a godfather to her baby.
But her life has become quieter with him, Iyawe said. Currie was part of her morning routine. She would speak to him in the morning during her commute to work about anything and everything. She isn’t sure how to fill that void.
“It’s the weirdest, hardest silence,” she said.
This story was originally published November 10, 2025 at 5:00 AM.
