‘Our community is better than this.’ Macon on pace to eclipse record 2020 murder toll
A deadly shooting inside a Macon gas mart Sunday night marked the city’s eighth fatal shooting or stabbing in a span of 25 days, a grim stretch that has vaulted Bibb County’s homicide rate to a pace ahead of last year’s record-breaking death toll.
As of April 19 in 2020 — a year that saw a modern-day-high 51 homicide victims countywide — 13 people had been killed in a total of 11 incidents that have or are likely to result in murder charges.
So far this year in such episodes, 15 people have been killed in 15 incidents.
At this point last year, in cases likely to be categorized as murders, there was a fatal shooting, stabbing or beating every 9.9 days. This year, the rate stands at one every 7.2 days.
Four other homicides in Macon this year include a pair of vehicular homicides and two other deaths in which suspects have been charged with involuntary manslaughter — the apparently accidental shooting of 8-year-old Miracle Brantley and a 54-year-old man killed in what the police have said was a downtown bar fight.
At the current rate with the involuntary manslaughter deaths included, Macon is on pace this year for 57 violent-crime deaths.
By comparison, a decade ago, in 2011, there were 13 homicides countywide for the entire year.
Bibb Sheriff David Davis on Monday told The Telegraph that the present trend is “a horrible, troubling circumstance.”
He said it seems that for more than a year now the COVID-19 pandemic has given way to “an epidemic of gun violence.”
“Unfortunately,” Davis said, “our community seems not to be immune to it. It just boils down to personal disagreements along with lack of self control, a disregard for human life and the vicious use of a firearm (that) has brought to this miserable reality.”
The sheriff, as he often has in the past year, expressed confidence in investigators to track down the killers responsible.
“But our community is better than this. ... And it’s gonna take the whole community coming together,” Davis said.
Davis said he knows that he is the one who has to answer to locals who may ask, “Sheriff, what are y’all gonna do about it?”
“We’re gonna go out there and try to catch who did it,” he said.
“Our folks are gonna be on the frontlines and welcome any assistance that we can get from the community with some of the underlying issues. There are things that are being done, it’s just gonna take time.”
This story was originally published April 21, 2021 at 5:00 AM.