In the minutes before Erica Powell was shot in the head, her husband, Walter Lowe, sat in his car in the couple’s Snellville driveway and drank a beer, a Gwinnett County police officer said.
Lowe is being held without bond, charged with Powell’s July 20 murder.
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As Lowe sat in his car around 8 p.m., a neighbor noticed that he looked distraught and walked over to ask what was going on.
“It’s all over,” Lowe told the neighbor, Officer John Cleland testified in a probable cause hearing Thursday.
The neighbor asked what Lowe meant.
“It’s all over,” Lowe allegedly repeated. “You’ll see later.”
At 8:41 p.m., Lowe was seen driving away from the house on Medlock Park Road, Cleland said. Powell was already lying dead in her bed.
Powell’s 12-year-old son got home from playing with a neighbor a few minutes later, around 8:45 p.m., Cleland said. The boy called out to his mother; when he didn’t hear a response, he assumed she had already gone to bed and watched television downstairs for another three hours.
At 11:45 p.m., the boy found his mother unresponsive and bloodied, lying face up, under the covers in bed, "as if she was sleeping," Cleland said. The boy went to a neighbor's house, and the neighbor called police.
Powell had told family members that Lowe was controlling and possessive, and that he sometimes used drugs, Cleland said. Powell and Lowe fought regularly, and Powell had talked about moving out of the home they shared. The couple had been together since 2011 and married in 2016. On what was supposed to be their one year anniversary, July 24, Lowe faced a first appearance hearing on the murder charge.
A 9mm gun was shot twice in the master bedroom that Lowe and Powell shared, Cleland said. One bullet hit the bed’s headbord; the other hit Powell in the head. Police do not believe the shooting was an accident because multiple shots were fired, Cleland said.
At the time of Powell’s death, Lowe was under indictment on charges of terroristic threats and acts, family violence battery and simple battery. Powell was the victim in that case, Cleland said.
After Powell was shot, Lowe’s cell phone was turned off. Lowe ended up at a friend’s door in DeKalb County at 5 a.m. July 21. The friend told police that Lowe looked sweaty and “like he was on something,” such as drugs, Cleland said.
Lowe told the man that he had “f---ed up” and shot his gun, but didn’t elaborate, Cleland said. Lowe asked the man for money, which the man provided, and left. Lowe’s car was later found at a Walmart near Panola Road in DeKalb County, Cleland said.
Lowe turned himself in to police on July 22. He is charged with murder, aggravated assault and possession of a firearm by a convicted felon.
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