Gun links Clark Atlanta shooting, Smyrna death

By RHONDA COOK

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Police found a gun that was taken during the fatal shooting of a Chattahoochee Tech instructor last month on a teenage suspect in a shootout near Clark Atlanta University 17 days later, WSB-TV reported Saturday.

Joseph Gunn, 54, who taught in the automotive and water sports repair department at Chattahoochee Tech, was shot and killed June 21 after confronting thieves trying to break into his truck, which was parked outside his Smyrna townhouse.

WSB reported that the gun found on Michael Wells, 17, when he was arrested earlier this month, after a shooting with Clark Atlanta University police, was Gunn’s.

Smyrna Police Department spokesman officer Michael Smith on Saturday declined to confirm that a weapon was taken during the Gunn shooting.

“We have no new information to release regarding the gun homicide,”Smith said.

Atlanta police spokesman officer James Polite also declined to comment Saturday, referring questions to Smyrna PD.

On July 8, Clark Atlanta University police saw Wells and another man with a gun, according to police.

Wells complied with their demands to drop his weapon, but the other man fired his gun. The campus police officers shot back, wounding the man, whose name has not been released.

Hours later, when detectives left Wells alone in an interrogation room at APD headquarters, the teenage suspect walked out unnoticed. Surveillance cameras captured images of Well getting onto an elevator, taking it to the ground floor and leaving the building.

Police found Wells several hours later at his girlfriend’s house.

Wells told WSB TV he escaped from police custody by picking the lock on his leg irons. APD is investigating the circumstances that allowed Wells to get away.