A woman has died after being found stabbed inside a vacant building at a notorious DeKalb County complex early Wednesday morning, Channel 2 Action News reported.
Police were called about 1:30 a.m. to the Brannon Hill condominiums off Memorial College Avenue outside Clarkston. They thought they were looking for a shooting victim, but investigators told Channel 2 they found a woman in her 30s stabbed at least once inside a boarded up apartment.
For their safety, responding medics took the woman across the street from the complex to treat her. She was dead at the scene, DeKalb police Sgt. Adam Quigley told the news station.
“Right now, our primary objective is to identify her,” Quigley said from the scene Wednesday. “We do have an adult male detained who is being interviewed at our headquarters building. It’s uncertain at this time what his role is, if he’s a witness or if he’s actually a suspect in this murder.”
Investigators think the woman was attacked inside the apartment, but the crime scene extends out into the parking lot, he said. It is likely the abandoned building, located at the back of the complex, was being used as shelter on a cold night.
Temperatures dipped into the 30s overnight in DeKalb County, according to Channel 2.
“This is an area we do respond to a lot,” Quigley said. “It does have a history of violent crime. This building inside our crime scene is vacant, no power. Really uninhabitable.”
RELATED:
In 2016, a judge cleared the way for the county to demolish four burned buildings at the privately-owned complex, which has been deteriorating for more than a decade, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution previously reported. Fire-ravaged and dilapidated buildings had become a haven for crime and homelessness.
Since then, more units have been brought down or boarded up.
RELATED: Burnt-out Brannon Hill condos can be destroyed
In the lead-up to the county's intervention, a local nonprofit group called the complex "the worst neighborhood in America."
—Please return to AJC.com for updates.
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