Credit: Jojo Shrewsbury
On the evening of July 14, 2024, Daniel Shrewsbury clocked in for a routine shift as manager of a Sonic Drive-In on Bandera Road in northwest San Antonio. By the end of the night, the 33-year-old was dead, shot in the parking lot after he confronted a group of customers he suspected of paying with counterfeit money.
In late January 2026, the person who pulled the trigger, Adiah Roberson, pleaded guilty and was sentenced to 40 years in prison for Shrewsbury’s murder. She was 17 at the time of the shooting and 19 when she stood in a Bexar County courtroom to accept the plea deal. The case laid bare how a minor dispute over a handful of fake bills at a fast-food restaurant spiraled into a killing that upended multiple lives.
What Happened in the Sonic Parking Lot
According to the San Antonio Police Department, the confrontation began when Roberson and several companions, including 29-year-old Joshua Joseph, attempted to pay for food with counterfeit bills. Shrewsbury recognized the cash as fake and confronted the group about the fraud.
When the group left in a vehicle driven by Joseph, Shrewsbury walked into the parking lot and photographed the license plate. It was a straightforward step, the kind of thing a manager might do to help police follow up later. But the car circled back. Roberson stepped out with a handgun, approached Shrewsbury’s vehicle, and shot and killed him, according to investigators.
A Three-Month Manhunt
Police quickly identified Roberson as the suspected shooter and arrested Joshua Joseph at his home, charging him in connection with the killing. But Roberson disappeared. The Texas Department of Public Safety placed her on its 10 Most Wanted Fugitives list, and the search stretched across the state for roughly three months.
Authorities finally located and arrested Roberson in Dallas in the fall of 2024. She was transported back to San Antonio to face charges of murder, aggravated assault, and forgery, according to Bexar County jail records.
The Plea Deal and 40-Year Sentence
A trial date had been set for late January 2026. Before the case went to a jury, however, Roberson accepted a plea agreement. She pleaded guilty to the murder of Daniel Shrewsbury and to the related assault and forgery counts.
A Bexar County judge sentenced her to 40 years in prison on the murder charge. The sentences on the remaining counts will run concurrently, meaning Roberson serves them simultaneously rather than back to back. Under Texas law, she must serve at least half of her sentence before becoming eligible for parole, which would place her earliest possible release around 2046, when she would be in her late 30s.
The legal outcome for Joshua Joseph, who was charged in connection with the incident as the driver of the vehicle, has not been publicly resolved as of March 2026. Court records do not yet reflect a trial date or plea for his case.
Who Daniel Shrewsbury Was
Shrewsbury was 33 years old and working as a manager at the Bandera Road Sonic at the time of his death. Colleagues and local residents described him as someone who took his responsibilities seriously. On the night he was killed, his decision to photograph a license plate reflected that sense of duty: he was trying to document a suspected crime so it could be reported, not to escalate a confrontation.
For the crew at that Sonic location, and for service workers across San Antonio who followed the case, the killing underscored a fear that has grown harder to dismiss: that even a low-stakes workplace dispute can turn lethal when a firearm is involved. The Bandera Road Sonic sits in a busy commercial corridor where families regularly stop for meals. After the shooting, the parking lot was cordoned off with crime scene tape.
Why the Case Stands Out
Workplace violence against service-industry employees has drawn increasing attention from labor advocates and law enforcement in recent years. The Bureau of Labor Statistics reported that workplace homicides in the retail and food-service sectors have remained a persistent concern, with hundreds of fatal injuries recorded annually across the U.S. But the specifics of this case set it apart from most: the victim was a fast-food manager, the trigger was a handful of counterfeit bills, and the shooter was a teenager.
The age gap between Roberson and Shrewsbury sharpens the tragedy. A 17-year-old chose to return to a Sonic parking lot with a loaded gun rather than simply drive away from a failed attempt to pass fake money. A 33-year-old manager, doing what he thought was the responsible thing, paid for it with his life. And a 29-year-old driver now faces his own legal reckoning for bringing the car back to the scene.
Roberson’s 40-year sentence will define the rest of her young adulthood and much of her middle age. For Shrewsbury’s family, coworkers, and the San Antonio community, no sentence changes the fact that a man was killed over a stack of bills that were not even real.
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