6 shot, 1 killed in shooting outside The Thirsty Turtle bar in downtown Macon
Bullet shell casings from a deadly barrage of more than 40 gunshots stretched 200 yards through the heart of downtown Macon in the wake of a shooting that wounded six people, killing one, early Friday after what police described as a possible brawl outside a nightclub.
Details of the incident’s origin remained sketchy well into the morning.
But authorities have since said a 22-year-old woman was fatally shot amid a spray of bullets that began about 2:45 a.m. outside the Thirsty Turtle bar at 425 Cherry St., just up from the intersection of Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard.
Jhacaya Mann, who would have turned 23 next month, was pronounced dead at a city hospital, Bibb County Coroner Leon Jones said.
‘An altercation’
In all, seven other people — three other women and four men — were wounded in the episode. Two of the men suffered stab wounds, officials said.
Sheriff’s Sgt. Linda Howard said someone believed to be involved “an altercation” outside the club either drove or rode up Cherry and opened fire on people standing outside.
Three of the shooting victims were taken to the hospital by ambulance. The five other victims, including the two men stabbed, arrived at the hospital in private cars, officials said.
One of the other female victims underwent surgery with life-threatening injuries, and she is in critical condition. The other victims were said to be in “stable” condition with non-life-threatening wounds.
Record homicides
Mann’s death marks the 47th homicide in Macon-Bibb County in 2020.
The sheriff’s office did not release a description of the suspect — if one was even known.
The investigation was still unfolding well into the daylight hours.
Cherry and Third streets reopened to traffic about 9 a.m. after firefighters spent the better part of half hour hosing dried blood off the streets and sidewalks.
A trail of since-collected shell casings, marked by bright-orange spray paint, stretched for nearly 600 feet from the front of the nightclub.
The trail appeared to move northwesterly up Cherry where the path hooked right on Third in front of the old C&S bank building that recently housed The Telegraph business offices.
‘Truly troubling’
Many of the shots appeared to have been fired at the corner of Third and Cherry in an area that during the day is frequented by pedestrians.
“It’s a truly troubling incident right in downtown,” Sheriff David Davis, who had been out of town, said upon arriving at the scene late Friday morning. “We’re trying to figure out what was the cause of all the violence.”
One ranking sheriff’s official said investigators spent much of the night combing the sprawling scene. The official said the hope was to get a clearer picture of what had happened so that cops could be familiar with “a map” of the shooting when they spoke to witnesses.
The episode comes as downtown is poised to welcome visitors to its annual Christmas-light extravaganza, part of which lies just across Cherry Street from the shooting scene.
Of the gunplay and its culprit or culprits, Sheriff Davis spoke of an “utter disregard of other people.”
“This was a crowded bar, a crowded scene,” he went on, “and people started indiscriminately shooting.”
Davis added that while the violent outburst “may seem random, there is probably some personal connection” or beef behind it.
The middle-of-the-night shooting downtown is reminiscent of another club-connected hail of bullets a block away 27 years ago on Poplar Street.
That episode, in March 1993, erupted about 2 a.m. outside the Fastrack Lounge, where some 50 shots were fired, killing a 19-year-old Macon man who had dashed down Poplar and ducked behind a car near Third Street.
Anyone with information is urged to call the Bibb County Sheriff’s Office at 478-751-7500, or call Macon Regional Crimestoppers at 1-877-68CRIME.
This story was originally published November 27, 2020 at 8:00 AM.