‘We need names,’ Warner Robins police chief says after shooting kills 1, injures 4
Warner Robins Police Chief John Wagner on Tuesday said detectives were continuing their search for the shooters responsible for a spray of Saturday-night gunfire that killed a 15-year-old girl and wounded four other teenagers.
The deadly gunplay happened at a block party on Mauldon Court in a neighborhood between Elberta and Johns roads, roughly a mile north of Northside High School.
The 15-year-old girl who was killed, Tanyla Johnson of McDonough in Henry County, had been in town visiting her family, the police chief said.
Four other teens suffered wounds that did not appear to be life-threatening. A young woman, 18, was shot in the cheek; a 16-year-old boy was shot in the hand; a girl, 17, was shot in her legs; and a 17-year-old boy was shot in the heel.
At 9:54 p.m. on Saturday, police answered a disturbing-the-peace call in the vicinity of Mauldon and Dunmurry Place in a neighborhood several blocks west of North Davis Drive.
A police statement later noted that the person who reported the disturbance said that “a large party in the area” was blocking a road.
When the police got there — arriving on foot after parking some distance away due to the crowd of cars — they began trying to break up the gathering. But as police later noted in their statement, some people in an automobile soon “began firing multiple shots” before riding away.
Wagner, the police chief, said it was not clear what may have prompted the gunfire. He said detectives were reviewing available video footage from the scene and that the belief was that at least two shooters were involved.
“We’re beginning to get a picture of what happened,” Wagner said.
He added: “Somebody knows the person or persons that were firing guns, and we need those names.”
Wagner said his heart goes out to the slain teen.
“She’s just an innocent victim,” the chief said, “and so are the other four that were injured.”