MACON, Georgia — Nearly seven years after a deadly family argument stunned Middle Georgia, the case of Kevon Lamar Watkins remains a haunting example of how everyday conflict can spiral into irreversible tragedy.
Watkins, now 24, is serving a life sentence for the 2018 killing of his sister, 20-year-old Alexus Breanna Watkins, inside their Macon home after a fight that started over the family’s Wi-Fi password.
The violence unfolded on February 2, 2018, at the family’s house on Westmont (also reported as Westmount) Road.
According to trial testimony, then-16-year-old Kevon had changed the household Wi-Fi password because he was frustrated with lag while playing an online Xbox game and wanted to be the only one using the internet. When his mother confronted him and tried to take the console, the dispute escalated.
Alexus stepped in to defend their mother and try to calm her brother down — a role relatives said she often played in the home.
What followed was described in court as a prolonged and deadly chokehold. Prosecutors said Kevon wrapped his arm around Alexus’s neck and refused to let go, even as she struggled and other family members begged him to stop.
A Bibb County deputy who responded to the 911 call later testified that when he entered the home, Kevon was still on top of his sister, restraining her by the neck. By then, she was motionless.
Alexus was rushed to a local hospital, where doctors pronounced her dead from asphyxiation.
A medical examiner concluded that the length and force of the chokehold had cut off her oxygen for several minutes, leading to irreversible brain injury.
During a later bench ruling, Superior Court Judge Verda Colvin noted that evidence showed Alexus had likely been held in the chokehold for around 10–15 minutes — far longer than it would have taken for her to go limp and stop breathing.
A Bibb County grand jury indicted Watkins on felony murder and aggravated assault in May 2018.
In August 2019, when he was 18, he was tried as an adult and found guilty of felony murder by a Bibb County Superior Court jury.
Judge Colvin sentenced him to life in prison, describing the case as one of the most difficult of her judicial career.
She pointed to testimony about near-daily fights in the home and said the household had “empowered chaos” instead of consistent discipline and emotional support, calling the crime a tragic endpoint to years of unresolved conflict.
In April 2022, the Georgia Supreme Court unanimously upheld Watkins’s conviction and life sentence, rejecting arguments from his attorneys that the evidence did not support a murder verdict.
The justices found that the length of the chokehold, the warnings from other family members, and Kevon’s refusal to release his sister until law enforcement arrived were more than sufficient to sustain the jury’s finding that his actions caused her death.
For the Watkins family, the legal outcome has not lessened the pain.
They lost two children in one night — Alexus to the killing itself, and Kevon to a life behind bars.
Community advocates and legal observers say the case continues to be used in conversations about teen anger, conflict inside the home, and the need for earlier intervention when families are struggling with chronic fighting and unchecked aggression.
As of late 2025, court records show no successful appeal or sentence reduction for Watkins.
He remains in state prison on a life term, while those who knew Alexus remember her as the sister who always stepped in to protect others — and who died trying to do the same on the night everything went fatally wrong.
