Hours after a 41-year-old woman was fatally shot by a Douglas County deputy during a struggle over a gun, a 57-year-old man was shot and killed Wednesday morning by DeKalb County police after he pointed a gun at officers during a foot chase, authorities said.
The GBI is investigating both incidents. They bring the agency’s number of officer-involved shooting investigations this year to 19.
Credit: JOHN SPINK / JSPINK@AJC.COM
Credit: JOHN SPINK / JSPINK@AJC.COM
In DeKalb, the GBI said Willie Roy Allen was shot multiple times at the end of a chase on Lithonia Industrial Boulevard. DeKalb police began pursuing Allen about 4:15 a.m. in connection to an earlier shooting.
According to police, officers were called to the area of Pine Mountain Road and spotted a vehicle “potentially involved” in the shooting near Covington Highway. The driver, later identified as Allen, took off and crashed moments later.
Officers chased Allen when he tried to run and attempted to stun him with a Taser, GBI spokeswoman Nelly Miles said.
“During this encounter, Allen pulls out a gun and multiple officers shoot and Tase him,” she said in a news release. “Allen dies at the scene.”
Officers later found another gunshot victim inside the crashed vehicle and took him to Grady Memorial Hospital, where he later died. Sabrina Glass told reporters at the scene her brother, 58-year-old Benny Glass, was shot inside his Jeep Cherokee during a robbery.
She went to the area of Chupp Road after getting a phone call from someone who witnessed the shooting. For hours, the family did not know if Benny Glass was dead or alive.
“They said some guy came up to my brother, shot him, pushed him over on the side of the seat, went into his pocket, got his money, got back into the Jeep, ran into a wall and ended up over here,” Sabrina Glass said.
She described her brother as a caring person who loved to laugh and doted on his grandchildren.
“Why did you take his life?” she said. “He would have given you whatever he had. All you had to do is ask.”
Credit: JOHN SPINK / JSPINK@AJC.COM
Credit: JOHN SPINK / JSPINK@AJC.COM
Police have not provided any further details on how Glass and Allen were connected. Allen’s death is the eighth at the hands of police in Georgia this year.
On Tuesday night, Shelby Jean Berkheimer was fatally shot after she did not respond to commands to drop her weapon during a struggle at a motorcycle dealership in Lithia Springs, according to the GBI. Douglas County sheriff’s deputies were responding to an armed robbery in progress at Mountain Motorsports on Thornton Road and reportedly found Berkheimer with a gun.
A deputy was also shot in the leg and is expected to recover.
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution also tracks officer-involved shootings that don’t involve the GBI, and those numbers sometimes differ from the GBI’s tally.
Credit: JOHN SPINK / JSPINK@AJC.COM
Credit: JOHN SPINK / JSPINK@AJC.COM
