A Virginia man has been sentenced to life in prison for gunning down his former best friend in a deadly love triangle that spiraled out of control.
Dustin Dove, 24, was convicted of first-degree murder for the May 2024 shooting of 22-year-old Seth Wallace, who later died from his injuries after weeks in the hospital. A jury found him guilty in April, and on Friday, a judge handed down the maximum sentence.
Dove and Wallace had once been inseparable after meeting at a Harrisonburg bar in 2022. But prosecutors say their friendship turned bitter in early 2024 after tensions flared over Dove’s girlfriend, 22-year-old Kaylee Turner. Defense attorneys claimed Wallace acted “inappropriately” toward her and later tried to turn her against Dove while he was serving time on drug charges.
The animosity escalated into a barrage of threatening texts, with both men trading cruel insults. In one message read aloud in court, Wallace allegedly mocked Dove’s mother’s cancer diagnosis. Prosecutors revealed that Dove filmed himself with the AR-15-style rifle used in the shooting, vowing revenge.
On May 24, 2024, Dove and Turner drove to Wallace’s house in Waynesboro. Prosecutors said Dove waited in hiding before opening fire, unleashing at least 15 shots, eight of which struck Wallace in the lower torso and groin. Gravely wounded but still conscious, Wallace named Dove as the shooter to responding officers. He died weeks later from septic shock after his injuries became infected.
Dove was arrested the next day after fleeing with Turner to West Virginia. While behind bars, he allegedly bragged in a jailhouse rap recording, saying: “He was my best friend, now he’s dead meat.”
Turner, originally charged as an accessory, is reportedly working on a plea deal with prosecutors.
Friends and family of Wallace have been left devastated, remembering him as a young man with his whole life ahead of him. A GoFundMe described him as “too young to be taken” by such an “act of hatred.”
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Author: thedailycrime1
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