Dayton James Webber, a 27-year-old quadruple amputee and professional cornhole player in the American Cornhole League, is accused of shooting and killing an acquaintance during a late-night argument in his Tesla SUV, then driving off with the body still in the car.
Bradrick Michael Wells was sitting in the front passenger seat when the argument turned deadly. Two other passengers were in the backseat. According to the Charles County Sheriff's Office, Webber allegedly shot Wells while driving through Maryland on Sunday night, then asked the backseat passengers to help drag Wells out of the vehicle.
They refused. Webber ditched them on the side of a road in Charlotte Hall, Maryland. Wells' body was still in the car.
Two hours after Webber left his passengers stranded, a person reported finding a body in a yard on Newport Church Road in Charlotte Hall. Officers arrived and pronounced Wells dead at the scene.
Webber, meanwhile, was more than 100 miles away. His Tesla was tracked to Charlottesville, Virginia, where he was found at a nearby hospital seeking treatment for what the sheriff's office described as a "medical issue." After his release from the hospital on Monday, the New York Post reported, officers with the Albemarle County Police Department arrested him.
He was charged as a fugitive from justice and is now awaiting extradition to Maryland, where he will face additional charges for first- and second-degree murder.
Webber's story, before Sunday night, was one of those rare human interest narratives that earns genuine admiration. He lost his lower arms and legs to a bacterial infection when he was just 10 months old. A 2023 ESPN profile chronicled his journey into competitive cornhole, where he carved out a career in the American Cornhole League despite his physical limitations.
At 12 years old, Webber told ESPN:
"I like using my strength and being fit. And I don't have to rely on other people to do stuff for me like you do in football. Sometimes when I watch my teammates in certain situations I wish I had hands, but I just try to do things my own way."
At the time, he said he wanted to be either a priest or a Secret Service agent when he grew up. He became a professional cornhole player instead, and the sports world celebrated him for it.
But there were other signals. Webber had posted a video of himself firing a 9mm handgun. The inspirational arc and the violent ending now sit side by side, and the contrast is jarring.
This is, on its surface, a bizarre and violent crime story. A man who overcame extraordinary physical adversity to compete professionally is now accused of murder. The details are grim: a late-night joyride, a heated argument, a gunshot, passengers abandoned on a dark road, and a body dumped in a stranger's yard.
It also raises straightforward questions that have nothing to do with ideology. How did the argument escalate so quickly? What was the nature of the relationship between Webber and Wells? And what was the "medical issue" that sent Webber to a hospital in Charlottesville after allegedly killing a man and fleeing across state lines?
The Charles County Sheriff's Office and the Albemarle County Police Department moved quickly. Webber was in custody within a day. Tesla's trackability likely made the job easier. Modern vehicles are not great getaway cars.
The legal process will sort out what happened in that SUV. But the human reality is already clear: one man is dead, two passengers were stranded witnesses to something horrific, and a story that once inspired people now ends in a murder charge.
Whatever you thought you knew about Dayton James Webber, Sunday night rewrote it.
