The first officer-involved shooting of 2022 in Georgia happened Monday night at a Dade County gas station after a wanted man drove toward Alabama deputies and was shot, according to the GBI.
Ethan Wayne Rogers, a 32-year-old from Fort Payne, Alabama, survived the shooting but is in critical condition at a Chattanooga hospital after undergoing surgery, the state agency said Tuesday in a news release. The GBI was asked by the Dade County Sheriff’s Office to handle the independent investigation, but the agency said no Georgia officers fired their weapons.
No deputies were injured.
Investigators from the DeKalb County Sheriff’s Office in Alabama said they followed leads on a stolen car and discovered it in far northwest Georgia, just south of the Tennessee state line, at a One 9 Pilot Travel Center along Ga. 299 just off I-24. After alerting Dade County authorities, they approached the car about 7 p.m. and asked Rogers to exit the vehicle. At that point, he “drove the car in the direction of one of the investigators,” the GBI said.
The agency said a second Alabama investigator then fired into the car, striking Rogers. Two passengers, a man and a woman, were not hit.
Rogers was charged with aggravated assault on a peace officer and theft by bringing stolen property into the state by Dade County officials. The woman was arrested on outstanding warrants, while the other passenger was released.
The GBI investigated 100 officer-involved shootings last year, four more than in 2020. The Atlanta Journal-Constitution also tracks officer-involved shootings that don’t involve the GBI, and those numbers sometimes differ from the GBI’s tally.
Anyone with information about the Dade County case is asked to contact GBI Agent Earl Glover at Earl.Glover@gbi.ga.gov.
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