As she ran from her Douglas County home, a teenager pleaded with her father who chased her with a shiny gun in his hand.
“No! Daddy! Please Daddy! No Daddy!,” neighbors heard her scream.
But it didn’t stop him. Cedric Prather had already shot and killed his ex-wife, her boyfriend and his own son inside the home. Outside, he shot his two daughters and another girl before turning the gun on himself. One of those girls died, and the other two were critically injured.
On Sunday, neighbors and friends recounted how they watched horrified as the shootings unfolded on Willow Tree Circle. Lots of people were outside enjoying the warm sunny Saturday afternoon. Some of those same people rushed to help the three girls as they lay shot in the road.
Prather, 33, had dressed in all black and driven into the neighborhood, neighbors told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Nick Cook said he’d seen Prather walking up the street talking on his cell phone and pacing about 10 minutes before shots were fired. “It was over the stupidest things,” Cook said. “It was over child support and taxes.”
At some point, Prather entered his ex-wife’s home, where he shot her, her boyfriend and his own son, authorities said. Next, neighbors saw the three girls run from the house. The oldest of the three girls was the one begging him to stop. Four gunshots later, all three girls and the gunman were bleeding in the street, witnesses said.
LaToya Andrews and Joseph Brown, both 33, died at the scene of the shooting in the Amber Forest neighborhood near Douglasville, Lt. Glenn Daniel said. A 7-year-old boy died at the scene and a 9-year-old girl died after being taken to the hospital, Daniel said. Authorities did not release the children’s names.
Prather died from his self-inflicted injuries at an Atlanta hospital. On Sunday, two girls — a 15-year-old and an 8-year-old — remained in critical, but stable condition, Daniel said. Brown’s daughter was one of them, a family friend said.
Investigators declined to speculate about a motive in the shooting, but it wasn’t the first time deputies had been called to the home. Twice in 2013, domestic disputes between Prather and Andrews led to calls to police, Daniel said Sunday.
Still, no one could have imagined fights between divorced adults would end so tragically.
"All I saw was tons of fire trucks and emergency vehicles and ambulances and sadly to say but, a child that was deceased in the road," neighbor Julie Futral told Channel 2 Action News. "It's very devastating, especially for the children."
Neighbor Diana DiVenti was clearly still shaken Sunday afternoon..
“Why would he shoot the children? Just shoot yourself. It’s terrible,” DiVenti said. “Last night I couldn’t get the, ‘Daddy no! Please. No’ out of my head.”
Brown and Andrews, both 2000 graduates of Carrollton High School, did not have a child together. But with five children between them, they were a happy, blended family, friends said. The oldest son of Prather and Andrews, a teenager, wasn’t home at the time of the shootings. Instead, he found out when a friend was bringing him home after his basketball game, a game that likely saved his life.
It was the same game Brown, Andrews and the other children were supposed to attend, but they never made it.
Brown never missed his standing appointment at his barbershop. Saturday morning, he brought along his girlfriend’s 7-year-old son, who could hardly sit still for his trim.
One of the children killed was the squirmy little boy who had just gotten his haircut, barber Kareem Balson told the AJC. Balson, a high school classmate of Brown’s, said the two men laughed at the boy’s inability to slow down for a haircut. Brown and the boy left Balson’s shop late Saturday morning.
Four hours later, both were dead.
“I don’t understand it,” Balson said. “I don’t have no train of thought. I don’t understand how people do it. It’s crazy that people are out there in this world.”
In his two decades of law enforcement, Daniels said he never imagined a mass shooting of this kind could happen, let alone in Douglas County.
Shocked family and friends spent Sunday mourning their loved ones while praying the two injured girls would survive. Some brought flowers and teddy bears to a memorial in the front yard of the Andrews’ home.
“Cherish your family and your kids because you never know. You never know,” Balson said. “I’m numb about it.”
Autopsies will be conducted at the GBI crime lab, the Douglas County coroner said. A press conference will be held Monday morning to release any additional information available, the Sheriff’s Office said.
An online fundraising "Go Fund Me" page was set up to assist with funeral costs for Andrews and her children. An organizer for the page wrote that the family did not have insurance.
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