A locksmith called to open a Buckhead apartment door was shot Thursday morning when the man requesting his help refused to give his name, police said.
Yuval Lerman, 23, was shot once at the Millworks Apartments on Emery Street, according to Atlanta police. He called for help about 12:15 a.m. from a location on Howell Mill Road.
Lerman told investigators he went to the upscale apartment complex on a service call, police spokesman Officer Steve Avery said.
“At the location, Mr. Lerman met with the suspect but refused to unlock the requested door because the suspect refused to identify himself,” Avery said in a statement to Channel 2 Action News. “The suspect then pulled out a handgun and shot Mr. Lerman.”
He was taken to a hospital and was stable Thursday morning.
An investigation is ongoing, Avery said. A suspect has not been identified.
The shooting was just one in a series of violent incidents across the city overnight. On Wednesday, police arrested a man accused of opening fire outside an Atlantic Station hotel and responded to a deadly shooting in southwest Atlanta. A few hours later, a man was found shot and killed inside an SUV at a park in southeast Atlanta’s Lakewood Heights neighborhood. No arrests have made in connection with the fatal shootings.
Credit: JOHN SPINK / JSPINK@AJC.COM
Credit: JOHN SPINK / JSPINK@AJC.COM
In a recent interview, interim police Chief Rodney Bryant was asked about the spike in shootings and homicides across the city this year. Bryant said the recent increase in violence is something police are seeing in major cities across the U.S., not just in Atlanta.
“I wouldn’t say that criminals are getting more brazen. I think what we’re recognizing through this COVID period is that there’s much more difficulty in people being able to have conflict resolution,” he said, adding that criminals have been violent for decades and “this isn’t a new phenomenon.”
“I think that what we are seeing during this unique time in our lifetime with this COVID pandemic is people are just a little less able to resolve a level of conflict,” Bryant said.
According to Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms, crime in the city is down about 20% overall, despite an uptick in homicides. The police department has investigated at least 108 homicides this year, eight more than in all of 2019.
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