Fire chief fatally shot while trying to help driver who hit a deer in AL, cops say
A Georgia fire chief was killed when a man opened-fire on him while he was trying to help a driver who hit a deer in Alabama, deputies said.
When deputies responded to the crash at about 5 p.m. Jan. 19, they found three people with gunshot wounds, the Chambers County Sheriff’s Office said in a Jan. 19 news release.
One of the men — later identified as 54-year-old Coweta County Battalion Fire Chief James Cauthen — was pronounced dead at the scene, deputies said. The other two men, including the accused shooter, were airlifted to hospitals, according to the sheriff’s office.
“This was an exceptional call that nobody could have been prepared for,” deputies commented in a separate post Jan. 20. “Our first deputy on the scene thought he was pulling up on a simple deer wreck.”
The sheriff’s office said the chief and the driver didn’t have cell service, so they were walking up a neighbor’s driveway to ask for help. Then the neighbor shot at them, deputies said.
The man will be arrested and charged with murder upon his release from the hospital, deputies said in the release.
The fire department described Cauthen as a “hard-working man with a gentle soul” who had been with the department for more than 24 years.
“We lost one of our brothers, leaders, mentor and family to a senseless tragedy,” the Coweta County Fire Rescue said in a Jan. 20 statement on Facebook.
Coweta County is about a 40-mile drive southwest from Atlanta.
