Police officers on Sunday shot and killed a man wanted in four weekend killings near Atlanta during an exchange of gunfire, with a sheriff’s deputy and two police officers wounded while trying to take the suspect into custody, authorities said.
Officials said Andre Longmore was shot during an intense manhunt for the 40-year-old suspect. The exchange of gunfire came a day after Saturday morning’s shootings rocked a bucolic subdivision in Hampton, south of Georgia’s main city.
Officials said Longmore was killed about 15 miles (25 kilometers) to the north of Hampton in suburban Jonesboro. A Henry County sheriff’s deputy and two Clayton County police officers were injured at separate locations in the attempt to arrest Longmore, they said.
One officer was shot in the back and was taken by helicopter to an Atlanta trauma center, Henry County Sheriff Reginald Scandrett said. “He is conscious, breathing and talking at this time,” Scandrett said of that officer.Clayton County Police Chief Kevin Turner said all three officers are expected to recover. Details on the conditions of the other two wounded officers weren’t immediately made public.
Hampton Police Chief James Turner said the four killed Saturday were all residents of the same Dogwood Lakes neighborhood where Longmore lived, and were all were shot within a 10-minute span. He identified the victims as 67-year old Scott Leavitt and his wife, 66-year old Shirley Leavitt, as well as 65-year-old Steve Blizzard and 66-year-old Ronald Jeffers.
Sherry Wyatt, who works at Hampton’s recreation center near Jeffers’ home, said Jeffers would regularly come in to sing at the senior center that shares the building.
Authorities had been seeking to arrest Longmore on four murder warrants for the deaths. Turner said Longmore’s motives remained under investigation.
Hampton is home to the Atlanta Motor Speedway, Georgia’s racetrack for NASCAR events. The most recent homicide before Saturday in the town of 8,000 had been in 2018, Turner said. “It’s not normal for us,” he said.
The shootings marked the 31st mass killing of 2023, taking the lives of at least 153 people this year, according to a database maintained by The AP and USA Today in a partnership with Northeastern University.
Hampton Mayor Ann Tarpley said the city would hold a prayer vigil Monday evening for the four victims and their loved ones.
