A Sedgwick County jury convicted Amunique Cavitt of second-degree intentional murder in the 2024 shooting death of Norman E. Carter III in Wichita.
WICHITA, Kan. — A Wichita woman was sentenced to 165 months in prison after prosecutors said she shot and killed her boyfriend on his birthday during a daytime confrontation on a residential street in April 2024.
The sentence closes the trial stage of a case that drew attention because of the age gap between the two people involved, the domestic violence finding attached to the conviction, and the prosecutors’ claim that the shooting continued after the victim fell to the ground. A Sedgwick County jury convicted Amunique Schare Cavitt in December 2025 of second-degree intentional murder in the death of Norman E. Carter III, known as Tray. A judge imposed the sentence in February 2026.
Investigators said the violence began hours before gunfire erupted near North Minnesota Avenue in Wichita. According to court records described in local coverage, Cavitt and Carter had been riding together in a Jeep when they began arguing. Cavitt later told police that Carter slapped her, hit her in the head several times and tried to strangle her. Officers noted scratches on her neck but reported no other visible injuries. Near the intersection of Minnesota Avenue and 13th Street, Carter got out of the Jeep. A witness told police it looked as if Cavitt tried to run him over after he stepped out. Prosecutors then said the confrontation moved from the vehicle to the street, where Cavitt got out and opened fire. Police were called at about 12:15 p.m. and found Carter with multiple gunshot wounds to his upper body. First responders began life-saving efforts before Sedgwick County EMS took him to a hospital, where police spokesman Andrew Ford said he was pronounced dead at 1:01 p.m.
The victim was 33 at the time of the shooting, according to the main case coverage, though some local reports listed him as 34. His obituary identified him as Norman Eugene Carter III and said he was born April 23, 1991, making the day he was shot his birthday. The same obituary described him as “a loving father” devoted to his daughter, Nakori. Prosecutors said officers recovered seven shell casings in the grass near his body, a detail that became part of the public account of the case. A charging document cited in Wichita news coverage said the shooting continued after Carter was already on the ground. That detail appeared central to the way prosecutors framed the case as an intentional killing rather than an act taken only in immediate fear. Cavitt was arrested later that afternoon and originally booked on a first-degree murder allegation. She remained in the Sedgwick County Jail on $1 million bond while the case moved through the court system.
The facts that became public also showed why the case was more complicated than a simple one-paragraph crime brief. Cavitt’s statement to police raised claims of violence inside the vehicle before the shooting, and the final verdict suggests jurors weighed those claims while still rejecting the most serious charge. In Kansas, second-degree intentional murder means jurors found an intentional killing without premeditation. The domestic violence finding meant the jury concluded the crime happened within an intimate partner relationship. The difference between the first-degree charge filed after the shooting and the second-degree conviction returned at trial marked an important shift in how the case ended. It showed the jury did not fully accept the prosecution’s highest-level theory, but it still found enough evidence to convict Cavitt of a serious homicide offense. Public reporting does not show a full trial transcript, so some details of witness testimony, forensic evidence and jury deliberations remain outside the public summary now available.
The procedural path of the case stretched across nearly two years. After the April 23, 2024, shooting, Cavitt was jailed and the case moved through Sedgwick County District Court. In December 2025, a jury found her guilty of second-degree intentional murder with a domestic violence finding. Then, on Friday, Feb. 13, 2026, Judge Tyler Roush sentenced her to 165 months, or 13 years and nine months, in prison. Public accounts do not describe any separate sentencing enhancement beyond the conviction itself, and they do not spell out in detail what either side argued at the sentencing hearing. They do make clear that the district attorney’s office treated the sentence as the formal close of the trial court phase. As of the latest public reports, no appeal filing had been described. The next formal milestone would typically be any notice of appeal, post-sentence motion, or later appellate review if the defense chooses to challenge the conviction or sentence.
The case also left behind the sharp contrast common in fatal domestic disputes: a chaotic and violent encounter described by police, and a grieving public record that focused on the victim’s life rather than the way it ended. Carter’s obituary remembered him as talented, creative, passionate and smart, and emphasized his bond with his daughter. Local coverage of the sentencing, by contrast, was spare and procedural, centered on the prison term and the conviction. Between those two public versions sits the unresolved human story that court records only partly capture: a couple arguing in a vehicle, a struggle that spilled into a neighborhood street, witnesses trying to understand what they saw, emergency crews arriving at midday, and a family left marking a birthday as the day of a death. Those details help explain why the case drew attention well after the shooting itself, even before sentencing was announced.
For now, the case stands as a second-degree murder conviction with a prison sentence of nearly 14 years. Unless a court filing changes that status, the next key development would be any appeal or post-conviction challenge filed after the February 2026 sentencing.