Two of the three men found shot to death on a Cobb County golf course July 3 had been bound and gagged with tape before being placed in the bed of a pickup truck, according to warrants made public Friday morning.
Bryan Rhoden, 23, was arrested Thursday after being identified as the “lone shooter” in the triple homicide. He was taken into custody at Chamblee police headquarters after authorities lured him to the station under the guise of returning a “large sum of money” seized Saturday during an unrelated DUI arrest, officials said.
Rhoden faces three counts of murder, three counts of aggravated assault and two counts of kidnapping in Saturday’s shooting deaths of golf pro Gene Siller, 46, and the two victims found in the truck, 46-year-old Henry Valdez and 76-year-old Paul Pierson, Cobb officials said.
Following a brief hearing Friday evening, Rhoden remains in jail without bond.
Investigators said Valdez and Pierson, who lived in other states, were found dead in the back of a Dodge Ram after Rhoden drove it onto the 10th hole of the Pinetree Country Club and got stuck near the green. The pickup belonged to Pierson, according to police.
Credit: Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Credit: Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Siller, a father of two and Pinetree’s director of golf, was shot in the head when he went onto the course to investigate, authorities said.
Valdez lived in Anaheim, California, and Pierson lived in Topeka, Kansas, officials said.
Credit: Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Credit: Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Rhoden’s arrest warrant alleges he used tape to bind the hands, legs and mouths of both Pierson and Valdez before concealing them in the enclosed bed of the white pickup. Investigators have not revealed where the men were killed or why they were in the Kennesaw area but said they did not appear to have any connection to the country club.
Officials have not said how detectives linked Rhoden, an Atlanta resident and aspiring rapper with a newly released mixtape, to the shootings and would not discuss a possible motive. A Cobb police spokesman said Thursday that details would come out in court.
Records show Rhoden was arrested on several traffic charges in Chamblee late Saturday, hours after the three bodies were discovered on the course. Rhoden was stopped about 11:30 p.m. while driving a black Maserati with a temporary tag in the 5000 block of Peachtree Boulevard, according to DeKalb County warrants.
Officers stopped the luxury car because it was missing a headlight and a taillight, according to the warrant. During the stop, police determined the temporary tag did not match the car’s VIN number. The vehicle’s registration had expired in June 2020 and Rhoden was driving without proof of insurance, authorities said.
Rhoden reportedly had two altered driver’s licenses, according to police, one from Georgia and one from South Carolina. Both licenses had Rhoden’s photo, but someone else’s name, authorities said. Those names were redacted in the warrants. Rhoden was also charged with DUI less safe after being given a roadside sobriety test and registering a blood alcohol content of .051, which is below the legal limit, warrants say.
Rhoden was booked into the DeKalb County Jail on misdemeanor charges of DUI, a headlight violation, fake ID, driving without insurance, driving an unregistered vehicle and using a license plate to conceal the identity of a vehicle, records show. He was released on bond Tuesday evening, then taken into custody on the Cobb murder charges two days later after returning to Chamblee police headquarters to retrieve his cash.
“At the time of the (initial) arrest, the suspect was still unknown to law enforcement as the shooter in the triple homicide,” Chamblee’s Assistant City Manager Mercy Montgomery said Friday. Rhoden was captured without incident after law enforcement set up a “sting” by using the confiscated funds to lure him to the station Thursday afternoon, she said.
He has been arrested before. As an 18-year-old student at Georgia State University in early 2016, Rhoden and another man were charged in a double shooting that took place during an apparent drug deal, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution previously reported.
According to GSU police, Rhoden met two other men outside his residence hall and was trying to sell them marijuana when an argument led to a shootout between Rhoden and a 19-year-old man.
Rhoden was hit once in the chest and shot the other man three times with a Glock .40. Both were taken to Grady Memorial Hospital and later charged with assault, attempted murder and possession of a firearm on campus. Investigators recovered both guns and what they described as “a significant quantity of marijuana” in Rhoden’s backpack.
He was booked into the Fulton County Jail but released three days later on bond. He was indicted, but it is unclear if his case ever went to court. Prosecutors dropped the 19-year-old’s charges, court records show.
In January 2020, the Atlanta Police Department’s Airport Drug Interdiction Unit seized nearly $19,500 in suspected drug money from Rhoden at Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport ahead of his one-way flight to Los Angeles, Fulton County forfeiture records show.
Court records said officers “initiated a consensual stop” after a police K-9 alerted them to the odor of drugs in Rhoden’s luggage.
“During ADIU’s interaction with Bryan Rhoden, (he) became irate and began swearing at ADIU officers,” according to the court records. “Bryan Rhoden punched an ADIU officer and elbowed another as he attempted to flee from ADIU officers.”
Authorities found nearly $2,600 on his person, nearly $6,900 hidden in the pockets of his sweatpants in his luggage and another $10,000 in his carry-on, court records show. A judge ordered that cash to be forfeited late last year, but it’s unclear if Rhoden was ever charged with a crime.
Less than four months later, Rhoden was arrested after Atlanta police found 44 marijuana joints and $3,000 in cash in his bag during a traffic stop, according to an incident report. The money was “uniquely separated,” the officer wrote, with each thousand dollar total wrapped in a rubber band to hold the money intact.
He was arrested in Indiana in August 2020 after leading state troopers on a high-speed chase following an attempted traffic stop, the Pharos-Tribune reported. Authorities told the Indiana newspaper that Rhoden was driving a Jeep Grand Cherokee Trackhawk south on I-65 when he passed a trooper traveling in excess of 100 mph.
The trooper chased the SUV for about three miles, but terminated the pursuit after reaching speeds of 150 mph in “heavy traffic conditions.”
The chase ended after Rhoden passed a second state trooper in a construction zone and crashed into a temporary barrier wall while trying to pass traffic on the right shoulder, authorities said, adding that the Jeep struck a guard rail and a bridge parapet before coming to a stop. He was booked on charges including resisting law enforcement, aggressive driving and two counts of reckless driving, police told the newspaper.
Rhoden performed under the stage name “B. Rod,” according to his social media pages, and lived in a high-end Midtown apartment. His first mixtape, “Made It Out,” was released June 18.
Credit: Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Credit: Atlanta Journal-Constitution
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