The GBI has released the identity of a Union City police officer who was injured in a shooting that left a man dead Monday evening.
Officer Jerome Turner Jr., who was taken to a hospital with multiple gunshot wounds, is stable after undergoing surgery Tuesday, the GBI said. Turner will undergo a second round of surgery to remove shrapnel from his knee, Channel 2 Action News reported.
Turner responded to a fight at a home on Stonewall Drive, according to the GBI. The officer was following up on leads in the case, which took him to the 6200 block of Highpoint Road, GBI spokeswoman Nelly Miles said.
At some point, Turner confronted 19-year-old Veltavious Griggs. He notified dispatch “he was chasing that individual,” Miles said during a Monday night news conference. “The individual also brandished a gun.”
Dispatch then lost contact with Turner.
During the chase, there was a shootout between the officer and Griggs, authorities told Channel 2 on Monday.
The officer was taken to Grady Memorial Hospital, Union City police spokesman Jerald January told reporters Monday. Miles said Turner was “alert and talking” on the way to the hospital.
Griggs died at the scene, according to authorities. A gun was also found at the scene, according to the GBI.
Union City Mayor Vince Williams told Channel 2 that Turner was shot five times in the incident. The mayor said Turner’s bulletproof safety vest saved his life.
“Because he had wounds to his chest that did not penetrate his actual chest,” Williams said.
The GBI was called to investigate the incident just before 7:40 p.m. It’s the 27th time this year the agency has been asked to look into a shooting involving a police officer.
People who live in the Highpoint Road area could not access their homes for hours.
The suspect’s mother, Shantrina Griggs, said her son was at the home of his child’s mother at the time of the shooting.
“My child dead,” she told Channel 2. “Why and who killed him? That's what I want to know.”
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