Where do the cases against the suspects in Young Dolph's killing stand a year and a half later?

Nearly a year and a half after Young Dolph's killing, the four men arrested and indicted in connection with the rapper's slaying still do not have a final court date in sight.

Three of the four men — Cornelius Smith, Justin Johnson and Jemarcus Johnson — each remain in jail, but Hernandez Govan, who officials say planned the killing, was given a bail Thursday morning and posted that bail the same day.

Govan was not originally given a bail amount, but prosecutors and defense attorneys came together and agreed that Govan's "safety and medical concerns (weigh) in favor of custody arrangements." Details of those arrangements remain under seal, with the consent order saying, "The parties agreed to a bond amount with arrangements for alternative restriction and supervision of the defendant pending trial."

His bail was set at $90,000 under the new consent order. He was being held without bail previously.

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Govan is facing conspiracy to commit first-degree murder, first-degree murder and criminal attempted first-degree murder. He was the third person to be arrested in the investigation.

Smith and Justin Johnson — believed by investigators to have been responsible for actually shooting Dolph — face first-degree murder, criminal attempted first-degree murder, unlawful possession of a firearm, employing a firearm with intent to commit a felony, theft of property between $10,000 and $60,000 and conspiracy to commit first-degree murder charges.

Neither Smith nor Justin Johnson have been assigned a bail amount, and the two continue to appear in court alongside one another.

The exception to Smith and Johnson appearing together has been due to the efforts of Johnson's attorney to restore his client's contact with family and friends after those were stripped. Johnson released a rap song, recorded off the jail telephone, and it was posted to YouTube.

That motion, which requested that Shelby County Criminal Court Judge Lee V. Coffee recuse himself from the case, failed after arguments.

Jemarcus Johnson, the brother of Justin Johnson, faces a single conspiracy to commit first-degree murder charge. Investigators alleged Jemarcus Johnson helped his brother escape and hide from law enforcement after the shooting of Young Dolph.

Jemarcus Johnson was given a $300,000 bail when he was booked, though he has not posted that.

All three of the men still in jail have been mostly confined to a solitary space, which Jemarcus Johnson's attorney said after a Friday court appearance, was for Johnson's safety.

"I think just because of a the nature of the case, oftentimes the jail will put those type of defendants in protective custody so that something else doesn't happen to them, or somebody in the jail doesn't try to attack them for notoriety or status in the jail," said Joshua N. Corman, Jemarcus Johnson's attorney. "So even though [Jemarcus Johnson] isn't necessarily someone with a bad history at all, that doesn't mean that he doesn't maybe need special protection from other people who see him as a potential target."

Corman also said "the level of culpability is very different for each person" in the case, and each of the defendants are being treated differently.

"I anticipate that we're going to have something worked out, hopefully, in the near future," Corman told reporters outside the courtroom. He did not say whether Jemarcus Johnson has been offered, or will take, a plea deal from prosecutors, though.

"We take it court date by court date," he said. "We know that the next court date is going to be in two weeks, and we hope that we'll have some progress over the course of the next two weeks — which I'm confident we will."

Jemarcus Johnson will next appear in court May 26, which is scheduled currently as a report date. Justin Johnson and Cornelius Smith are slated to be in court June 9, also for report dates. Govan will not be in court again until July 13, which is a report date.

Young Dolph was fatally shot inside Makeda's Homemade Butter Cookies, located off Airways Boulevard, Nov. 17, 2021. An autopsy report indicated Dolph, born Adolph Thornton Jr., was shot multiple times in his head, neck and torso.

In the days that followed, a shrine to the Memphis-based rapper developed outside of the shuttered bakery. The memorial was eventually taken down, and the location re-opened after initial plans to permanently close the bakery.

Lucas Finton is a criminal justice reporter with The Commercial Appeal. He can be reached at [email protected] and followed on Twitter @LucasFinton.

This article originally appeared on Memphis Commercial Appeal: Young Dolph case: Where do things stand over a year later?