What began as an armed robbery call Thursday evening led to a wild police chase through two metro Atlanta counties. Now, a teenager is dead, a man is behind bars facing multiple felonies, and a third suspect is wanted by police.
The pursuit began shortly after Cobb County police responded to an armed robbery call at a home in Mableton, agency spokesman Sgt. Wayne Delk said. Officers later spotted the three suspects in a car on I-20 and chased them into Atlanta.
Authorities said the men lost control and slammed into an abandoned car on the right shoulder of the interstate before getting out and running. One of the suspects, a teenager, ran onto nearby Martin Luther King Jr. Drive, where he was struck by a van and killed about 5:15 p.m., according to police. He was identified by the Fulton County Medical Examiner’s Office as 17-year-old Khawann Heard.
A second suspect, 21-year-old Ahday George, was chased to a nearby apartment complex, where officers spotted him getting into a rideshare vehicle, Atlanta police spokesman Sgt. John Chafee said.
“An APD officer quickly determined the suspect had asked a bystander to order him the ride,” he said in an emailed statement. Using that person’s phone, officers were able to track the car and pull it over before taking George into custody.
George was initially arrested on an armed robbery charge, but investigators announced Friday that he was linked to a grisly January homicide in which a teen was shot to death and left in a burning Chevrolet Impala.
Police responded to the car fire on Argus Circle shortly before midnight Jan. 20. According to the incident report, a 911 caller noticed the burning vehicle in his northwest Atlanta neighborhood and used a fire extinguisher to snuff out the flames. Inside the Impala, police found the body of 19-year-old Ja’Kendrick Taylor with a gunshot wound to the head.
Investigators declined to explain how they linked George to the teen’s death, but Atlanta police said they found two guns that George reportedly hid while running away.
The third suspect involved in the Mableton robbery escaped officers and remains at large. Police have not released his name.
George was booked into the Cobb County Jail following the chase, but will be extradited back to Fulton County to face murder and aggravated assault charges in Taylor’s death, investigators said.
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