(Update: This article was updated at 5 p.m. Monday, March 23, to include details from Deraje Jackson’s arraignment, including the probable cause affidavit filed with the court.)
McALESTER — More than six years after taxi driver Dustin Parker was found fatally shot behind the wheel of his cab, an arrest has been made in the Jan. 1, 2020, killing after the alleged shooter turned himself in Friday at the McAlester Police Department.
According to investigators, officers were dispatched to the area of West Cherokee Avenue in McAlester early New Year’s Day in 2020 after a woman reported hearing six gunshots. An officer arrived in the area at approximately 6:30 a.m. and located the taxi near the intersection of South B Street and West Delaware Avenue. The officer told dispatchers that “something went through the window of it.” The officer discovered Parker in the driver’s seat and requested medics after finding Parker had been shot.
In the initial stages of the investigation six years ago, authorities questioned a person of interest who was later released. Despite continuing to pursue leads in the years that followed, no arrest had been made until Friday.
The McAlester Police Department worked the case with assistance from the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation, while community members organized support for Parker’s family in the aftermath of the killing. Friends and family also announced a $20,000 reward for information leading to an arrest.
Jail records indicate Deraje Nathanial Jackson, 29, was booked Friday into the Pittsburg County Jail on a complaint of first-degree murder.
Pittsburg County District Attorney Chuck Sullivan said Jackson turned himself in at the McAlester Police Department on Friday afternoon and confessed to killing Parker. Sullivan said formal charges are expected to follow, with Jackson’s arraignment set for later today.
MPD Lt. Kirk Johnston released a brief statement on the arrest.
“Deraje Jackson was arrested and booked into the Pittsburg County Jail,” Johnston said. “A probable cause affidavit has been presented to the Pittsburg County District Attorney’s Office for the charge of first degree murder, with formal charges pending. The investigation is still ongoing, and further information will be released when it becomes available.”
Parker’s death drew national attention, with advocates noting he was among the first reported transgender homicide victims in the U.S. in 2020.
Parker was a founding member of Oklahomans for Equality‘s McAlester chapter, also known as Southeastern Equality. His death prompted a response from then–Democratic presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren at the time.
“Just a few hours into the new year, another trans American was killed in a senseless act of gun violence,” Warren said then. “Dustin Parker was a father, a husband and an advocate who looked out for his community. We must fight for justice for him and all trans Americans.”
Widow: Family wants closure if claim is legitimate
Jackson’s confession has left family members cautiously hopeful but uncertain about what comes next.
Dustin Parker is survived by four kids and his wife, Regina Parker, who said she was told by law enforcement that the person who turned himself in claimed he wanted to come forward out of his own conviction.
Still, the sudden development has raised questions for the Parker family.
“I still don’t know much more than that,” Parker said. “When I asked the officer who came to my door why this was happening, the only explanation they gave me was that [Jackson] just wanted to come clean out of his own conviction.”
Regina said the name of the person who confessed had never surfaced during years of conversations with investigators and others familiar with the case.
“From every person that’s contacted me, from the investigation side of it, all of the names that they’ve given me, all of the ‘he-said, she-said’ I’ve heard, this person’s name has never come up, ever,” she said. “It’s been six years, and all of a sudden, unprovoked, this person that no one’s ever heard of says, ‘Hey, I did it.'”
She said investigators told her the confession still must be verified and further investigated and that the arrest hinged on information the suspect allegedly knew that had not been made public.
She also said a case agent from the FBI informed her this morning that federal investigators would step back from the case, with local authorities assuming control because the person who confessed is not a tribal citizen, even though Parker was.
Sullivan said he was unaware of federal involvement in the case, but he said the U.S. Supreme Court ruling in Oklahoma v. Castro-Huerta means the state of Oklahoma can assume criminal jurisdiction over Jackson because he is not be a member of a Native American tribe.
“It’d be unusual for the feds to step in and take it, just to take it, because that’s basically what they’d be doing,” Sullivan said.
Regina Parker said she had prepared for the possibility that her husband’s murder might never be solved, but now she hopes the confession could finally bring answers.
“I’m interested to see where this goes and if it’s something that is legit, because our family just deserves to have this closure, if that’s really what it is,” she said.
Even with a confession, Regina Parker questioned the aptitude of the Pittsburg County DA’s Office and expressed worry the case may not be tried correctly.
“I’m concerned about that, because obviously our DA doesn’t have a super great reputation of following up,” she said. “You know, nothing that gets tried in this area ever has a reputation of actually being handled correctly.”
Sullivan, who is not expected to run for reelection this year, bristled at the suggestion his office would not handle the case effectively.
“Under the law, we have the responsibility and authority to prosecute this case, and we will do so to the fullest extent,” Sullivan said. “We’ll be reaching out to her and talking to her about her concerns.”
Parker said that, over the last six years, she has tried to keep her husband’s case in the public eye despite the possibility it would go unsolved.
“I had honestly made my peace with knowing that it wasn’t going to be solved because no one was coming forward, and I just felt like the community kind of forgot about him and that no one cared,” she said.
Parker said that, even when a social media page dedicated to cold cases would share Dustin’s case, nothing would come of it other than a few shares and condolences.
“That is literally where it would all stop. You know, ‘This was such a sad thing.’ You know, ‘He deserves justice,’ but it never went any further than that. And then I had tried to pursue, like, other media, other ways of getting his name out there, but no one was willing to work with me and law enforcement because it was an ongoing investigation,” Parker said. “So even though I was getting contacted by these places — podcasts and whatnot — that were willing to give him the exposure, I couldn’t do anything with it.”
Jackson ‘had been sitting around pondering’ confession
Jackson was formally charged Monday with murder in the first degree and appeared for his initial arraignment before Pittsburg County Judge Mindy Beare via video feed from the Pittsburg County Jail.
With little visible emotion on his face, Jackson walked into the jailhouse courtroom Monday afternoon alongside other detainees appearing for their arraignments.
When Beare called Jackson’s name, she asked if he understood the charge against him, and Jackson said he did. In her standard practice for all defendants who appear for arraignment, Beare entered a plea of not guilty for Jackson.
When asked by Beare what the state was requesting for his bond, Pittsburg County Assistant District Attorney Lauren Dutton requested a bond of $1 million. The request garnered gasps and murmurs from the other detainees, with guards having to tell them to be quiet.
Beare accepted the request and set Jackson’s next court date for April 2. Jackson then walked back to his seat with his head down.
In a probable cause affidavit written by Johnston, who helped investigate the case in 2020, Johnston said he received a phone call Friday from dispatch saying a man wanted to speak to someone about a crime he had committed.
“I was told that the male stated he had shot someone six years ago and needed to talk to someone,” Johnston wrote.
Johnston wrote that he walked downstairs with another detective and met with Jackson, who told the investigators he was brought to the station by his brother and wanted to turn himself in for shooting someone in 2020.
The affidavit states that after reading him his Miranda Rights, Jackson told Johnston what happened that night:
Deraje said that he had gotten a cab ride and it was less than a mile ride. He said he was charged $20 for the ride and felt like he had been ripped off. He said that he thought the cab driver’s name was Dustin. He said that the cab driver had a camera in the cab pointed towards him and it made him angry. Deraje said that after he was dropped off by the cab, he waited for some time. He said that he called the cab company back for a ride and waited in someone’s yard on Delaware Street. He had recalled he was in an area where there were a couple of vacant houses. He said that the cab pulled up and he saw it was the same driver as before. Deraje said that he walked up on him and shot him. He said that he was on the driver’s side of the cab and shot about eight times.
I asked him about the gun that he used, and he said it was a Ruger 9 mm semi-automatic handgun. I asked him where the gun is now, and he said that he threw it into a lake around Grandview, Missouri. I asked him if he had used any drugs or other substances prior to shooting the cab driver. Deraje said that he was using several drugs at the time, but had not used at the time of the incident. Deraje said that he was by himself during the shooting and just prior to it. He said that it was about 5 or 6 in the morning when it happened.
As to why Jackson suddenly confessed, Johnston wrote that Jackson said he “had been sitting around pondering it” and that he had been out of prison for two years.
“He said that [prison] changed him, and he had been thinking about this incident,” Johnston wrote. “He told me that he knew some people in the military, and he did not want his actions to affect them.”
According to the affidavit, Jackson said he hid out at a friend’s house after the shooting before taking a bus a couple of days later to Kansas City, Missouri, and then taking an Uber to Grandview where his family lived.
“He said that his mother and father live there, along with a brother. I asked him about who he had told about this. He said he told his parents, but only vaguely that he shot someone, and did not give them any details about it,” Johnston wrote in the affidavit. “I asked him about the lake he threw the gun into. He said it was called Longview Lake in Grandview. He said he had his cousin take him there. Deraje said he does not remember what part of the lake it was and that the cousin that took him there is deceased now.”
Johnston wrote in the affidavit that he then took Jackson into custody for murder.
Court records outline Jackson’s incarcerations
Records from the Oklahoma Department of Corrections indicate Jackson has cycled through incarceration and supervision multiple times between 2015 and 2022.
Before his alleged killing of Dustin Parker, Jackson was released from DOC custody Oct. 10, 2019, after serving time tied to several revoked suspended sentences in Pittsburg County District Court. Those cases included charges of attempting to perform an act of violence and carrying a weapon with unlawful intent.
Following that release, Jackson remained under supervision through DOC for multiple cases until April 18, 2022. After a July 11, 2022, bench trial in Pittsburg County, he was sentenced to four years in DOC custody for possession of a firearm after a former felony conviction, along with one year for a misdemeanor count of knowingly receiving or concealing stolen property.
Jackson appealed that case to the Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals, arguing he had received double punishment because the firearm formed the basis for both charges and that prosecutors failed to prove he knowingly possessed the weapon. The appellate court upheld the firearm conviction but dismissed the stolen property count.
According to DOC records, Jackson was discharged from custody April 4, 2024, after serving just more than one year of the four-year sentence.
