A postal worker was killed on the job. Her ex-boyfriend had been stalking her, witnesses say
Six months ago, the couple had a baby together.
But on Monday night, 22-year-old Tyrika Terrell was shot in the head and killed right outside of the Decatur, Ga. postal office where she worked — and investigators have said that her estranged boyfriend is the suspected shooter, WSB-TV reports.
Witnesses said that Terrell’s estranged boyfriend had been stalking the young mother in the days leading up to her death, according to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
Terrell had started working for the postal service in October, U.S. Postal Inspector Clifton Bell told the Journal-Constitution. After the shooting, Terrell was transported to Grady Memorial Hospital. She later died.
“USPS is of course devastated by what happened,” Bell said in a statement to the newspaper. “The postal service offers its condolences, thoughts and prayers to her family.”
The incident occurred in the parking lot near a loading dock behind the Decatur facility, Patch reports. Witnesses told FOX 5 that four shots were fired.
Terrell’s mother, Eugina Terrell, told WXIA that her daughter and her boyfriend had separated about a month earlier.
But when Eugina spoke with the boyfriend on Monday — the day of her daughter’s shooting death — he had made cryptic comments.
“He said, ‘I’m sure you’re going to take good care of Kyrra, g-mama. You’re going to take good care of Kyrra. That is my baby girl,’” Eugina Terrell told WXIA.
Friends gave us this photo of Tyricka Terrell - 22 y/o postal worker shot & killed during her shift yesterday. Investigators say her boyfriend/child's father did it. Live report at 5pm on Ch2 pic.twitter.com/tHMESNthuR
— Tyisha Fernandes (@TyishaWSB) November 28, 2017
A woman who allegedly witnessed the violent incident that led to Terrell’s death said the suspect calmly waited in a nearby laundromat for about 30 minutes, FOX 5 reports.
“He was just as calm, cool and collected,” she told FOX 5. “You wouldn't think he was up to anything just by talking to him.”
But the suspect allegedly kept looking out the window.
“You could tell he was up to no good,” one worker told WXIA. “Especially when he started peeping out.”
The woman FOX 5 interviewed, a laundromat employee, eventually left the coin laundry to visit a nearby store, she said.
“When I was coming back up the sidewalk, he was coming out of the door,” she told FOX 5. “Apparently, he seen the girl and he bent the corner and I heard ‘pow pow pow pow.’ I came in and I locked the door.”
Witnesses say the man who stalked and killed his girlfriend - as she finished her @USPS shift - just had a baby with the victim. They said he was walking in & out of the coin laundry place moments before he fired the shots. Story at 5pm on Ch2 pic.twitter.com/KLBrdPq3WK
— Tyisha Fernandes (@TyishaWSB) November 28, 2017
Family members are now planning Terrell’s funeral, they told WXIA.
“It is going to be devastating this Christmas,” Eugina Terrell, her mother, told the TV station. “It is going to be rough for me, it is going to be really rough.”
Police told WXIA that they are looking for a specific individual in connection with the case, but have not yet released a name.
This story was originally published November 28, 2017 at 7:02 PM with the headline "A postal worker was killed on the job. Her ex-boyfriend had been stalking her, witnesses say."