A routine custody exchange in Covington, Georgia ended in deadly violence on September 11, 2022. Thirty-three-year-old Desiree Cash Thomas and her boyfriend, Craig Joshua Thomas had arrived to drop off Desiree’s 15-year-old daughter with her ex-husband, Marques Smith. The teenager told adults she did not want to stay with her father, and Smith then retrieved a handgun, returned to the vehicle where Desiree and Craig were seated, and opened fire in front of the child.

The couple’s car rolled forward after the shooting and struck a mailbox a few houses down the street. Craig Thomas was pronounced dead at the scene; Desiree Thomas died in the ambulance en route to the hospital. Smith fled but later arranged to turn himself in to the Newton County Sheriff’s Office around midnight and was arrested. The case record notes a prior 2017 aggravated battery conviction involving Desiree.

Does anyone have information about the exchange that evening or about the family dynamics leading up to September 11, 2022?