At least 13 security guards have been shot, five fatally, in metro Atlanta since April 2021.
Oct. 25: One security guard died and another was hospitalized after a shooting outside a DeKalb County nightclub. The guards were attempting to break up a fight at the Cosmopolitan Premier Lounge when they were shot in the parking lot at about 2:30 a.m., according to DeKalb police. At least two dozen evidence markers that appeared to indicate shell casings lined the parking lot of the Glenwood Road club, leading from the front doors to the back of the lot about 50 yards away.
Sept. 8: A security guard was shot outside an Old Fourth Ward apartment building after confronting a group of people breaking into cars, Atlanta police said. The guard was making rounds at the Station 464 Apartments on Boulevard when he came upon the three men in a parking lot around 5:15 a.m., according to police. He was shot once and said to be stable.
Aug. 11: A security guard was shot at the Columbia Grove apartments on Johnson Road in northwest Atlanta, according to police. Witnesses said a man came out of an apartment firing shots and after a verbal altercation with the guard, he fired a shot at him, striking him in the leg.
May 18: A security guard was shot at Buckhead’s Fogo de Chao, a Brazilian steakhouse in the 3100 block of Piedmont Road. Restaurant staff called for help with handling an unruly patron, police said. The man tried to leave the restaurant when one of the restaurant’s security guards tackled him, according to police. That’s when Nygil Cullins, 22, fired shots and struck the security guard, whose name was not released. An officer shot and killed Cullins, who died at the scene. The security guard was being treated at Grady Memorial Hospital.
April 18: Anthony Frazier, 51, was shot and killed outside of American Seafood and Wings, the Cleveland Avenue restaurant where he worked as a security guard, police said. Officers were called to the small strip mall just south of the I-75/85 split shortly before 7 p.m. and found Frazier dead. Atlanta police announced an arrest in the case on Thursday.
April 4: An off-duty Cobb County officer was not seriously injured when shots were fired toward him as he patrolled Cumberland Mall. The officer had received word from a security guard to be on the lookout for two suspicious vehicles about 2:30 p.m., according to police. Days later, the suspect, 20-year-old Demarco Mauge of Duluth, was shot and killed by another Cobb officer during a traffic stop, the GBI said.
Feb. 19: DeKalb County officers found 24-year-old Henry Ashley, who worked as a security guard at the Courtesy Chrysler Dodge dealership near the Mall at Stonecrest, with a gunshot wound around 11 p.m., police said. In March, a 16-year-old was arrested on murder and burglary charges. Investigators said they were still searching for four more suspects in the case.
Credit: JOHN SPINK / AJC
Credit: JOHN SPINK / AJC
Feb. 2: Tyshon Ross, a 28-year-old security guard gunned down shortly after midnight as he escorted a man out of the Encore Hookah Bar and Bistro on Luckie Street, according to Atlanta police. Damon John-Michael Wilson, 21, was arrested two weeks later and charged with murder, aggravated assault, possession of a firearm during the commission of a felony and simple battery.
Aug. 2, 2021: A Brinks security guard was taken to a hospital after he was shot during an armed robbery outside of a Holly Springs medical center, according to police. Officers were sent to Wellstar Cherokee Health Park on Wellstar Way after a report of a shooting came at about 7:45 a.m., Holly Springs police said. When they arrived, they found the wounded Brinks security officer. The suspect was later identified and linked to additional crimes, according to police.
Credit: Steve Schaefer
Credit: Steve Schaefer
June 13, 2021: Two 15-year-olds wanted to get into the Apple store at Lenox Square after hours, so one of the teens shot and critically injured a security guard, Atlanta police said. The two teenagers, a boy, and girl, were quickly arrested and the guard survived his injuries. The suspects arrived after Lenox closed and shots were fired around 8:30 p.m., more than two hours after the mall closed, according to police.
April 11, 2021: Two security guards were taken to a hospital after a patron shot them at the Members Only Lounge on Ralph McGill Boulevard in northeast Atlanta. Owned by Atlanta rapper 2 Chainz, Members Only bills itself as “Atlanta’s exclusive VIP lounge for the city’s socialites and elite professionals.”
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