Share and Follow
Inset left to right: Re’Al Butler and J.C. Butler (Hampton Police Division). Background: The residential area near a school where Martez Johnson Corey was shot and killed in Hampton, Virginia (Google Maps).
Two siblings in Virginia have been arrested in connection with a fatal ambush-style shooting, law enforcement in the state has confirmed. The tragic event, which unfolded in the city of Hampton, has left a community grappling with the senseless loss of life.
Re’Al Butler, age 24, and his brother J.C. Butler, 25, face serious charges including first-degree murder, conspiracy to commit murder, and using a firearm in the commission of a felony. The charges extend to shooting into an occupied dwelling and discharging a firearm within 1,000 feet of a school, as outlined by the Hampton Police Division. Additionally, J.C. Butler faces the added charge of possession of a firearm by a convicted felon.
The incident took place in June 2024 along Old Buckroe Road, a location within Hampton, which is situated just south of Newport News. The victim, identified as 26-year-old Martez Johnson Corey, tragically lost his life in the shooting.
Authorities responded to the scene on the evening of June 1, 2024, at approximately 7:30 p.m. They discovered Corey with life-threatening gunshot injuries. Despite the valiant efforts of the Hampton Fire and Rescue Division to save him, Corey was pronounced dead at the scene.
The shooting occurred a short distance from Robert R. Moton Elementary School, adding to the community’s concern and distress, as reported by Hampton’s ABC affiliate, WVEC.
The investigation went on for months with little public progress. In March 2025, the Butler brothers were arrested and charged. The pair was formally indicted in November of last year, Hampton General District Court records show. So far, law enforcement are keeping mum about what tied the defendants to the attack.
As the defendants’ trial approaches, details about the shooting are still scarce — a point of consternation for the victim’s family.
“There has been no reason for them to say why they shot him,” William Corey, the victim’s father, told Portsmouth-based NBC affiliate WAVY earlier this week. “They’re still in a place of being in denial, saying it wasn’t them.”
The grieving father said there was no indication his son even knew the alleged assailants before the fatal shooting.
“I don’t know any relationship they had,” he added. “Nothing at all.”
On the night in question, the victim was shot while sitting outside at a residence. Several bullet holes are still visible in the facade.
“He was sitting on a friend of the family’s front porch,” William Corey continued. “It was a little hole. Martez couldn’t get out, and as he tried to get up, they just shot him and left him there to die, and by the time the police and paramedics got there, he was dead…From what I heard, he was shot probably eight to 10 times.”
The state of his son’s body forced a closed-casket funeral, the victim’s father added.
“I had to take his ashes and sprinkle them on his mother’s grave,” William Corey went on. “So whenever I go past that area, I always just go out to say hi to him and his mom.”
The Butler brothers are being detained in the Western Tidewater Regional Jail. Their trial is slated to begin on March 24.