Family ‘beef’ on Facebook leads to fatal shooting of 21-year-old

A Newark man has admitted he was responsible for a 21-year-old Roselle man's shooting death after a fight over a social media snipe involving a family member, acting Union County Prosecutor Jennifer Davenport said.

Nathaniel Price, 28, pleaded guilty on Monday to a charge of first-degree aggravated manslaughter and two related second-degree weapons offenses in connection with the death of Tyquan Johnson.

Very early in the morning of Jan. 21, 2017, Roselle police found Johnson shot a number of times, sitting in the driver's seat of a vehicle on Rivington Street. He was pronounced dead a short time later.

Prosecutors said the shooting had followed a long and heated argument and physical fight involving more than half a dozen people, sparked by a post made on social media that Price believed insulted a relative of his.

Price turned himself over to authorities three days after the shooting. The handgun used in the shooting, with Price’s DNA on multiple parts of the weapon, was found in a home near where the fight took place.

He is expected to face 24 years in state prison when sentenced on June 14, with 85% of that term to be served before the possibility of parole under New Jersey’s No Early Release Act.

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