This is aweful! That poor child!



http://www.ajc.com/metro/content/shared ... 73264.html

Police: Man fatally shot after killing boy with ax

By Saeed Ahmed

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Published on: 06/06/06 12:25 AM
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A Fulton County police officer fatally shot a man Monday night after he killed a boy with an ax and then tried to attack the officer, police said.

A spokesman for the police department said the officer responded to a call of a child hurt at the Chastain apartments on 4558 Roswell Road in Sandy Springs about 8:30 p.m.

There, he found a 9-year-old boy lying on the street outside with an ax “embedded in his face,” said the spokesman, Cpl. Gary Syblis.

The suspect, a 22-year-old man, was still at the scene at the time. When the officer tried to talk to him, he ran across Roswell Road to another apartment complex, the Chateau Villa apartments, Syblis said.

The officer followed. The suspect threw a tire at the officer from the second or third floor stairway of an apartment, Syblis said.

The tire struck the officer, breaking his arm, Syblis added.

The man then tried to come after him with a stick with a metal handle, prompting the officer to fire three times and hit the man, police said.

Both the officer and the suspect were taken to a local hospital, where the suspect died from his wounds.

Police did not want to divulge a motive for the death of the child, but said the suspect was not related to the boy nor did he know him.

The investigation continues, and the officer was placed on routine administrative leave.

The Fulton County Medical Examiner’s Office said early Tuesday morning that it could not release the name of either the boy or the suspect as their next of kin had not been notified.

Both the apartment complexes are home to mostly Hispanic residents, many of whom tried to make sense Monday night of why a man would so brutally kill a child.

In the absence of indisputable facts, rumors and hearsay spread among residents. The boy had said something to anger the man, some speculated. The boy was playing with friends, and the man just charged at him, others reported having heard.

“It’s just an ugly scene and we’re still sorting through all of it,” Syblis said.