Crime

What happened to man found dead along I-75 south of Macon? Investigation is under way

Telegraph file photograph
Telegraph file photograph

Sheriff’s officials in Crawford County on Friday were awaiting autopsy results to help them figure out what happened to a 42-year-old man whose dead body was spotted by a motorist not far from Interstate 75 on Thursday evening.

The circumstances of the man’s death or how long his body had been there were not immediately clear, but on Friday he was identified as Terlonzo Elwond Martin of Huntsville, Alabama. Martin also had ties to south Georgia.

Sheriff Lewis Walker told The Telegraph on Friday that while foul play may not be involved in Martin’s death that investigators might know more after a GBI medical examiner’s findings.

Martin’s body was found shortly before 6 p.m. Thursday.

A sheriff’s deputy in neighboring Bibb County was handling a wreck along the interstate when a passerby pointed out what turned out to be a dead body lying in a partially wooded area 100 yards or so to the east of the freeway’s northbound lanes, Walker said.

The place where the body was found lies just south of the Echeconnee Creek, Bibb’s southern border, in a sliver of Crawford County that juts between the interstate’s Sardis Church Road and Byron exits.

This story was originally published October 20, 2023 at 12:00 PM.

Joe Kovac Jr.
The Telegraph
Joe Kovac Jr. writes about local news and features for The Telegraph, with an eye for human-interest stories. Joe is a Warner Robins native and graduate of Warner Robins High. He joined the Telegraph in 1991 after graduating from the University of Georgia. As a Pulliam Fellowship recipient in 1991, Joe worked for the Indianapolis News. His stories have appeared in the Washington Post, the Seattle Times and Atlanta Magazine. He has been a Livingston Award finalist and won numerous Georgia Press Association and Georgia Associated Press awards.
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