The man accused in a June 5 Buckhead crime spree that left a jogger wounded by gunfire and a pedestrian who had been taking out the trash seriously injured is now accused in a June 4 shooting in Roswell, according to police.
Roswell police have charged 22-year-old Gaelen Newsom with aggravated assault in a shooting near the intersection of Old Roswell and Holcomb Bridge roads. No one was injured in that incident, which happened around 9:25 a.m. June 4. A driver’s van was damaged by the gunfire. The driver told investigators a man in a gray-colored sedan fired the shots; there was no prior confrontation.
On June 5, police say, Newsom fired shots at joggers in Buckhead. One man was injured.
Andrew Worrell, 41, was out for a morning walk near the 1200 block of West Wesley Road about 8:30 a.m. when a man drove by and began shooting from a car, he told police.
“It seems like some sort of miracle that it didn’t do any major damage,” his wife later told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. “We feel very grateful.”
Shortly after Worrell was taken to Grady Memorial Hospital, police learned that two joggers had been shot at along the same road, police said. Nobody else was struck, Deputy Atlanta police Chief Charles Hampton Jr. said.
About three hours after the joggers encountered gunfire, a man was struck by a car at an apartment complex along Noble Creek Drive, leaving him severely injured.
Police said the man was taking out the trash at the Collier Ridge Apartments when a silver sedan hit him and pinned him to an unoccupied pickup truck. The driver of a silver Kia Forte, similar to the one described in earlier incidents, was taken into custody. The suspect was later identified as Newsom.
Newsom was booked into Fulton County jail on June 5 and charged with two counts of criminal attempt to commit murder, three counts of aggravated assault, aggravated battery, and four counts of possession of a firearm during a crime in the incidents, Atlanta police said.
The Roswell shooting was among at least 40 roadway shootings this year around metro Atlanta. Many are attributed to road rage and 13 people have been killed. A majority of those cases remain unsolved, according to police agencies.
Collaboration between police agencies led Roswell police to charge Newsom, the agency said in an emailed statement.
“The Roswell Police Department would like to thank our partners at the Atlanta Police Department and the Fulton County District Attorney’s Office for their assistance and collaboration in bringing this case to a closure,” Roswell police said.
Newsom was denied bond at his first court appearance and remained Wednesday in the Fulton jail.
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