A midday dispute in a Lithia Springs Walmart parking lot ended in a fatal shooting on February 17, 2019. Forty-five-year-old Johnathan Liddell of Austell was shot while seated in his red Chevrolet Cavalier after a road encounter with Othello Lamar Jones, an off-duty U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer who had been at the store with his wife and children.

Witness statements and surveillance footage were used to reconstruct events. According to Jones, after a brief roadway incident he parked beneath a camera and, when Liddell parked alongside him, saw Liddell point a handgun at him. Jones fired a personally owned 9mm Glock, striking Liddell in the chest. Responding officers found a black handgun in Liddell’s car that was later identified as a plastic airsoft gun. Liddell was pronounced dead at the scene.

Douglas County District Attorney Ryan Leonard reviewed the investigation and announced that no charges would be filed against Jones, concluding Jones reasonably feared for his family’s safety and that the replica was indistinguishable from a real firearm. Did anyone witness the initial road interaction or see either vehicle before they arrived at the Walmart parking lot?