A Dunwoody woman refused a ride from police shortly before she apparently walked on to I-285 where she was killed when struck by multiple cars, closing the interstate for hours
Sandy Springs Police have released more clues Tuesday about 53-year-old Gayla Walker as they try to solve the mystery of how she ended up dying on the roadway Thursday morning.
Dunwoody Police officers met with Walker for about 10 minutes around 5 a.m. at a service station on Ashford Dunwoody Road near the interstate after respoinding to a call about woman behaving erratically, Sandy Springs police said in an emailed statement to Channel 2 Action News.
“Officers attempted to give Ms. Walker a ride home but she refused the offer,” police said. “Ms. Walker left the Exxon on foot walking southbound on Ashford Dunwoody Road. Once a photo was published of her after the accident, one of the original responding officers to the call at the Exxon recognized her.”
Walker’s death was discovered during the Thursday commute when drivers reported her remains on the westbound roadway but misidentified them as belonging to an animal. When officers investigated they discovered human remains spread across multiple lanes of the busy interstate.
Dunwoody Police Officer Timothy Fecht said police were called to an Exxon station near Perimeter Mall when Walker refused to leave the premises.
Police offered Walker a ride to her apartment, but she refused, Fecht told WGCL-TV.
“The officer said ‘Hey, is there a family member we can speak to, or a daughter,’” Fecht told the news station.
Instead Walker told police not to call her family, Fecht said.
The westbound interstate was shutdown at 6:35 a.m. for three hours.In the meantime, I-285 became a bumper-to-bumper mess that stretched more than 7 miles to beyond Spaghetti Junction, while eastbound traffic was jammed back to I-75 by onlooker delays.
The gridlock wasn’t confined to I-285, either, as authorities shut down the ramps from Ga. 400 to I-285 westbound, leading to drive times of nearly 90 minutes to get from Alpharetta to I-285.
Anyone with information about the incident can also submit an anonymous tip to Crime Stoppers at 404-577-8477.
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