A man had been arguing with his ex-wife over income taxes and child support before he went to her house and killed her and three other people and then fatally shooting himself in 2015.
As she ran from her home, a teenager pleaded with her father who chased her with a shiny gun in his hand.
“No! Daddy! Please Daddy! No Daddy!,” neighbors heard her scream.
But it didn’t stop him.
The shooting happened just after 3pm on February 7, 2015 as neighbors were outside enjoying unusually warm weather. 33-year-old Cedric Prather Jr. parked about a quarter of a mile from the home, in suburban Atlanta, Georgia. He walked inside, fatally shooting his ex-wife, 33-year-old Latoya Andrews, and her boyfriend, 33-year-old Joseph Terry Brown.
Prather also fatally shot two of his children, including one of whom a neighbor said begged him not to pull the trigger.
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The shooting happened in a subdivision in Douglasville, about 20 miles west of Atlanta. Prather killed his seven-year-old daughter, London, and nine-year-old son, Jerimiah. He shot and wounded two other children, who are in critical condition: Andrews’ 15-year-old daughter, Demesha Owens, and Brown’s seven-year-old daughter, Jada Brown.
A third child of Andrews and Prather, a 13-year-old boy, was not home at the time. Prather and Andrews were married for about 11 years and had been divorced about five years.
There had been no prior reports of domestic violence and there was nothing in Prather’s record that jumped out as a red flag.
Neighbors heard gunshots within a few minutes of Prather’s arrival and called 911. A witness told police one of Prather’s children was heard outside pleading with him not to shoot. Prather killed himself in the street.
Friends of Prather told police he had been upset and angry lately. One friend had called Prather to check up on him and was on the phone with him as the shooting happened.
Prather used a .45-calibre handgun to shoot all the victims and himself. The Douglas County sheriff’s office is working with the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives to trace the gun and determine whether he had it legally.
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Teresa Carter said she heard the gunfire from inside her home but didn’t see what happened. Carter said she often saw the children playing in the driveway and around the neighborhood. They enjoyed petting her dog.
“I heard shots, and I heard the girl scream,” Carter said. “And then I heard four more shots.”
Brandon Hallman was working on a car a few houses down when the shooting started.
“I heard a couple quick shots, you know, back to back to back. Went out there and, you know, looked and it was already over,” Hallman said. “We just grabbed some towels and kind of went down there to try and help before the paramedics got here.”
Neighbor Diana DiVenti was clearly still shaken the next afternoon..
“Why would he shoot the children? Just shoot yourself. It’s terrible,” DiVenti said. “Last night I couldn’t get the, ‘Daddy no! Please. No’ out of my head.”
Latoya and Joseph, both 2000 graduates of Carrollton High School, did not have a child together. But with five children between them, they were a happy, blended family, friends said. The oldest son of Prather and Andrews, a teenager, wasn’t home at the time of the shootings. Instead, he found out when a friend was bringing him home after his basketball game, a game that likely saved his life.
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It was the same game Latoya, Joseph and the other children were supposed to attend, but they never made it.
Joseph never missed his standing appointment at his barbershop. That morning, he brought along his girlfriend’s 7-year-old son, who could hardly sit still for his trim.
One of the children killed was the squirmy little boy who had just gotten his haircut, barber Kareem Balson said. Balson, a high school classmate of Joseph’s, said the two men laughed at the boy’s inability to slow down for a haircut. Joseph and the boy left Balson’s shop late that morning.
Four hours later, both were dead.
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