Teenager charged with murder after Columbia man was killed in Forest Acres, cops say
A week after a Columbia man was shot and killed, a teenager was arrested and charged with murder, the Forest Acres Police Department said Wednesday at a news conference.
Tyrik Edgerton, 19, was taken into custody without incident on Tuesday night at the same apartment complex where the victim was shot, Forest Acres Police Chief Don Robinson said.
On Feb. 2, Brandon Van Dyke was found behind the wheel of a car at The Landings at Forest Place Apartments, according to police. That’s at 3431 Covenant Road, near North Beltline Boulevard.
The 30-year-old Columbia resident was taken to an area hospital where he died from a gunshot wound, police said.
Robbery is believed to be the motive for the shooting, according to Robinson. Edgerton is from the Lexington area, but Robinson said he believes the teenager was temporarily residing at the apartment complex with a family member.
Information about what Van Dyke was doing at the apartment complex was not available.
Edgerton is being held at the Alvin S. Glenn Detention Center and awaiting a bond hearing, according to Robinson. He’s scheduled to return to court on April 1, Richland County judicial records show.
“Our community is safer,” Robinson said. “My promise to the city of Forest Acres is our police department will work tirelessly to keep our community safe.”
Despite the arrest, Robinson the shooting is still under investigation, and declined to say if there are more people who could have been involved and might face criminal charges. Robinson also didn’t answer a question about a possible relationship between Van Dyke and Edgerton.
Some of Van Dyke’s relatives attended the news conference. In a message relayed by Forest Acres police spokeswoman Lynnsey Baker, his family said in addition to being a proud graduate of Dreher High School and the College of Charleston, “Brandon was a beloved son, brother, and nephew.”
“Now we are doing everything we can to bring closure to the Van Dyke family,” Robinson said. “I want to express my deepest sympathies to the family.”
As part of the investigation, Robinson said he met with the manager of The Landings at Forest Place Apartments about establishing a safety plan for the community. Some of the issues they discussed include loitering and lighting problems, and a curfew was mentioned as a possible solution, according to Robinson.
Additionally, police have gone over all of the incident reports from the property during the past six months to track crime trends in an effort to come up with a safety plan to make the area more secure.
“We want to ensure it’s a safe place to call home for all of our neighbors that live at the complex,” Robinson said.
Richland County Sheriff Leon Lott was at Wednesday’s news conference. The Richland County Sheriff’s Department assisted in the investigation by providing crime scene and forensic investigators, according to Lott.
Robinson is a former Richland County Sheriff’s Department investigator and captain who was officially sworn in as Forest Acres police chief on Tuesday.
“We’re working together as a team,” Lott said. “Our goal is to arrest the bad guy, and that’s what happened in this case.”
The Columbia Police Department and South Carolina Law Enforcement Division (SLED) also provided assistance to Forest Acres police.
“It was a huge collaborative effort,” Robinson said of the investigation. “We acquired all these people to help so we could get a speedy resolution.”
This was the first homicide in Forest Acres since the shooting death of Officer Greg Alia on September 30, 2015, according to the release.
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This story was originally published February 9, 2022 at 12:25 PM.
