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Suspected shooter in Barnesville triple shooting found dead in Atlanta

By and FOX 5 Atlanta Digital Team
Updated  June 21, 2023 6:53pm EDT
Crime and Public Safety
FOX 5 Atlanta

1 dead, 2 injured in shooting at church

Police in Barnesville, Georgia, say someone shot and killed a woman and left two other people, a man and a woman, hurt in a church's parking lot.

BARNESVILLE, Ga. - A small town about an hour south of Atlanta has been rocked by its first homicide in more than two years.

Police in Barnesville, Georgia, say someone shot and killed a woman and left two other people, a man and a woman, hurt in a church's parking lot located along Carey J. Buckner Street around 6 p.m. Tuesday.

Crime scene technicians gathered evidence in the parking lot overnight.

According to investigators, the three people were sitting in a parked car around 6 p.m. Tuesday when the gunman pulled up and started firing.

Barnesville Police Chief Belinda Penamon said the victims crossed paths with the suspect after running out of gas. 

"We don't actually know at this time. Our assumption is that they ran out of gas and someone was putting gas in the car," Chief Penamon said.

Barnesville triple shooting suspect dead

A woman is dead and two people wounded after a shooting in Barnesville Tuesday. Police say the gunman later took his own life. The GBI is heading the investigation.

Chief Penamon says he does not believe there are any other connections between the suspect and the victims.

One woman died from her wounds. Medics rushed another woman and a man to a local hospital. Officials have not given an update on the surviving victims' conditions.

Police say they haven't determined a motive for the shooting.

The Georgia Bureau of Investigation has identified the woman who was killed as 33-year-old Yasmine Wright of Barnesville. They have also identified the suspected shooter as 33-year-old Eric Spradley of Barnesville. The GBI says Spradley was later found dead in Atlanta from what is believed to be a self-inflicted gunshot wound. 

Penamon says the last known homicide in Barnesville was two years ago.

"This is not something that happens here all the time.  We're trying to put things together and make it make sense right now," she said.

Joston Banks was working at a nearby barbershop when shots rang out.

He told FOX 5's Deidra Dukes, "And I looked over there across the street and I seen this guy run down there by the police station and he collapsed."

Virginia Bannister discovered the wounded man just steps from her front door.

"I just seen some guy collapsed right here and I was like 'Oh my God!', and he said, 'I been shot, I been shot, I been shot'," Bannister said."And then I walked back there they (police) had all this blocked off and that's when they said someone was laying in there dead."

"I'm overwhelmed because it's a small community," resident Eric Hamm said. "Everyone pretty much knows each other, and what could spark something like this to happen. I mean it's devastating." 

This investigation is active and ongoing.  Anyone with information is encouraged to contact the Barnesville Police Department at 770-358-1234 or the GBI Regional Investigative Office in Milledgeville at 478-445-4173. Anonymous tips can also be submitted by calling 1-800-597-TIPS (8477), online at https://gbi.georgia.gov/submit-tips-online, or by downloading the See Something, Send Something mobile app.