Arrest made in fatal shooting at rural house party promoted on Snapchat

MILLGROVE, Ind. (WISH) — A 23-year-old felon in Wayne County has been arrested in connection with the fatal shooting of a 21-year-old during a party of about 100 people in Blackford County in June, the Blackford County sheriff told News 8 on Wednesday.

Michael Norris, 21, died at the party in the early morning hours of June 29 at a rural home near the unincorporated town of Millgrove in southeastern Blackford County, Sheriff Jim Heflin told News 8.

Heflin said the party where the fatal shooting happened grew to about 100 people after it was promoted on Snapchat. The sheriff said two people came to the party from Ohio, and they were temporarily held after the shooting to provide investigators with information about what had happened.

Norris, a 2022 Blackford High School graduate, was a certified welder and heavy equipment operator for Special-T steel fabricator in Hartford City, his obituary said.

The sheriff said the shooting happened about 2:45 a.m. June 29 at a house at 2225 S. County Road 500 East.

Online maps show the house is surrounded by farm fields and sits about a mile north of the unincorporated community of Millgrove. It’s about a 1-hour, 45-minute drive northeast of downtown Indianapolis.

A news release issued Wednesday from the Blackford and Wayne counties’ sheriff’s offices said that Deontae E. Gabbard, of Richmond, was arrested on Tuesday in connection to the fatal shooting, and he will face criminal charges in Blackford Circuit Court. The release said those charges could include felony counts of murder; unlawful possession of a firearm by a serious violence felon; two counts of pointing a firearm; and intimidation with a deadly weapon.

Online court records on Wednesday afternoon did not show any charges filed against Gabbard in Blackford County.

Gabbart was arrested Tuesday for violating probation in another case, online jail records show, although they didn’t provide details.

Online court records from Wayne County show an arrest warrant was issued July 3 for Gabbard in connection to violating probation in a January 2023 case where he pleaded guilty in September 2023 to burglary and was sentenced to more than two years in prison. The online court records did not provide details how he may have violated probation.

Online state prison records show he was released Oct. 29.

In a June 2021 case in Wayne County, he was charged with three counts of armed robbery, but online court records were unclear about whether he was sentenced and whether his plea deal in that case was accepted.

Also, online court records show, Gabbard had previously pleaded guilty in a October 2020 case in Wayne County on carrying a handgun without a license, and he received a suspended jail sentence.

In addition to Gabbard’s arrest, the release from the Blackford and Wayne counties’ sheriff’s offices said 12 arrests had been made in connection to events at the party, but only mentioned that two of those arrests involved charges of assisting a criminal.

The Richmond Police Department’s special weapons and tactics team on Tuesday arrested Gabbard and two other people connected to the fatal shooting case at an apartment in Richmond, the release said.

Otherwise, no details were provided on the other arrests.

The release also said nine firearms were “removed from the streets.”

Gabbard remained in the Wayne County jail on Wednesday afternoon but, the release said, he will be taken later to the Blackford County jail.

News 8 reached out to the Blackford County coroner by email to learn the manner and cause of Morris’ death, but did not immediately received a response.

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