Tempers can often flare during commuting hours in Atlanta, but police say those frustrations do not justify firing gunshots on crowded interstates.
Officers charged a woman with aggravated assault and aggressive driving after she admitted Monday afternoon to shooting at another driver on I-20 West, according to an Atlanta police incident report obtained by AJC.com. That bullet ended up striking a man’s foot.
The incident took place before 5:30 p.m., with officers being called to two different scenes by the two drivers, AJC.com previously reported.
RELATED: Man shot in leg during road-rage incident on I-20 in Atlanta
Police first met with Alexis Yvonne Adams, born in 1991, of Decatur, who was in the 100 block of Hamilton E. Holmes Drive, the report said. She told the officer that she was driving to work on I-20 West when a white van got in front of her black Kia and was driving aggressively.
She said the driver flashed the van’s headlights at her and attempted to drive beside her vehicle while using an HOV lane, the report said. Adams told the officer she thought the van’s driver was following her.
As the vehicles neared the Martin Luther King Jr. Drive exit, the “van then took the lane to the right of her vehicle, so that its front bumper was aligned with her rear bumper,” the report said. The woman then told police she heard what sounded like a gunshot, but she never saw the van’s driver hold a firearm.
She wasn’t injured, but she decided to slow down, roll down her passenger-side window and fire a single shot at the van, which struck the driver’s-side door, the report said.
At that point, she called 911, the report said. However, the van then struck her rear bumper, forcing them both to pull over.
As Adams approached the van, she said the driver said, “(Expletive), back up. I’m going to (expletive) kill you,” as he pointed a pistol at her.
She was still on the call with 911, so the dispatcher advised her to get away from the incident, the report said. The officer noted that the bumper of her Kia was knocked off and the trunk was caved in, but there was no gunshot hole anywhere on the car.
Adams was booked into the Fulton County Jail on the two charges, according to jail records. She remained there Tuesday without bond.
The officer later met with the driver who had been shot, whose story began quite differently.
He told the officer that his van was approached by a black Kia, whose driver was very aggressive, the report said. He said the Kia’s driver flashed lights at him, pulled up next to him to curse and shout at him and repeatedly slammed her breaks after getting in front of his van.
He said he was driving the speed limit the entire time until he was shot in the foot, the report said. He told the officer he then chased after her vehicle, slamming into the Kia’s rear bumper to prevent the driver from escaping.
They both pulled over, and he said that is when he grabbed his handgun to threaten the woman as she approached, the report said. He then called 911.
The officer cited the man for reckless driving, but he was not booked into the county’s jail.
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