Mobile police in June 2014 identified a suspect in a morning shooting on Valeria Street that sent a woman to the hospital, and appealed to the public for help finding him.
The Mobile Police Department said 42-year-old Julius "J.T." Cornilius Tolbert was the suspect in the shooting, which unfolded on a Tuesday morning in a residential stretch of the city.
How the case unfolded
According to police, officers were informed around 9:40 a.m. that a woman with a gunshot wound had arrived at Springhill Medical Center. At about the same time, the department received a report of a shooting in the 3100 block of Valeria Street.
Investigators connected the two reports and, in the hours that followed, named Tolbert as the person they were seeking in the case. Police did not immediately release further details about the circumstances of the shooting or the relationship, if any, between the suspect and the woman who was wounded.
Police ask for the public’s help
The department asked anyone with information about the suspect to come forward. Residents were urged to call the Mobile Police Department or to contact Mobile Police Intel. Tipsters could also submit information anonymously by texting the keyword CRIME411 to the CRIMES tip line.
Appeals of that kind are a routine but important part of investigations in Mobile, where detectives frequently rely on tips from neighbors, witnesses and others who may have seen something to help locate a suspect quickly. In naming Tolbert publicly, police signaled that they had developed enough information to focus their search while continuing to gather evidence.
The role of public tips
The shooting was among the incidents that drew the attention of Mobile police that summer as the department worked to respond to reports of gun violence in the city’s neighborhoods. Officials emphasized that identifying a suspect was a step in the process, not a conclusion, and that the case remained under investigation as they sought to bring the person responsible into custody.
Such tip lines have long been a staple of Mobile investigations, giving neighbors and witnesses a way to assist without appearing publicly, an option police stress in cases involving guns. The shooting on Valeria Street reflected the kind of daytime violence that concerned residents of the surrounding neighborhood, where the sound of gunfire in the morning hours drew a quick response from officers.
The woman who was wounded had made her own way to Springhill Medical Center, and it was her arrival there that first alerted police, who then linked the case to reports from the 3100 block. By identifying Tolbert publicly, the department shifted part of the search to the community, hoping that someone who recognized the name or knew his whereabouts would come forward. Officials said the investigation would continue until the person responsible for the shooting was located and the circumstances behind it were fully understood.