ROSSVILLE — With 10 officers waiting for him outside, Walker County Sheriff Steve Wilson said, Christopher Shell emerged from his front door and raised a rifle “in a threatening manner.”
Officers then opened fired Sunday night, killing Shell and ending a standoff that lasted 45-60 minutes. Wilson said during a news conference Monday a deputy and a sergeant had both called out to Shell several times during the standoff, telling him they wanted to talk about a 911 call reporting domestic violence.
Wilson also said a deputy spotted Shell through the window, loading a .50-caliber muzzleloader. The deputy called for backup, and members of the sheriff’s office, the Fort Oglethorpe Police Department and the Georgia State Patrol arrived.
After Shell came outside with his gun, Wilson said, three deputies opened fire: C.A. Black, J.C. Wooten and R.C. Galyon. Georgia State Patrol Sgt. James McConathy said troopers J.L. Gass, S.L. Poteet and J.W. Ballard were also “involved in the situation.” He declined to comment on whether they fired shots.
The Georgia Bureau of Investigation is reviewing the shooting. Joe Montgomery, assistant special agent in charge of the GBI’s Calhoun Office, declined to comment on how many officers said they shot toward Shell.
“The officers fired multiple times,” Montgomery said. “And he was hit multiple times.”
Members of the GBI’s crime lab will conduct an autopsy this morning. The agency’s investigators also will await the results of a toxicology report to see if Shell had any drugs or alcohol in his system before the GBI gives the evidence to Lookout Mountain Judicial Circuit District Attorney Herbert “Buzz” Franklin, who will decide whether to prosecute any of the officers.
Montgomery said the officers were on Cochran Drive when Shell walked outside. He did not know how far away they stood. He declined to comment on what specifically Shell did to threaten the officers with his gun and whether he aimed the weapon.
“We’re still investigating, trying to get all the facts right before we release (that information),” Montgomery said.
Deputies arrived at Cochran Drive after Shell’s girlfriend ran to a neighbor’s house, Wilson said. The girlfriend said Shell beat her, and officers found her with bruises and cuts on her face. Wilson said she told the investigators she lost consciousness during the attack.
Police also arrested Shell in April, Walker County court records show. The case was dismissed last week.
The officer-involved shooting comes amid a national debate about policing. And on Monday, FBI Director James Comey announced that his department plans to release a more detailed national report about how police use deadly force.
Lacking “comprehensive data only stalls meaningful conversation and fuels empty debates, both within law enforcement and in the communities we serve,” Comey wrote in a message along with the release of the FBI’s 2014 crime statistics, according to the Washington Post.
The federal government tracks police shootings but has acknowledged the data is incomplete. The reporting system is voluntary, and not all agencies participate in it.
Montgomery said Sunday’s death was the first officer-involved shooting the department has investigated since July, when a Bartow County Sheriff’s Office deputy killed a man who was reportedly charging with a baseball bat toward a second deputy.
Wilson said this is the fourth officer-involved shooting in the 19 years he has been sheriff in Walker County. Before Sunday, the most recent shooting occurred in June 2009, when John Coates shot at officers outside a Chick-fil-A.
Coates hit Fort Oglethorpe Officer Mitchell Moore, but body armor absorbed the shot. Deputy Terry Miller then shot and killed Coates.
Wilson could not recall Monday whether the agency reports officer-involved shootings to the Georgia Crime Information Center as part of a monthly statistical filing. Wilson, who is also the president of the Georgia Sheriff’s Association, said members of the organization have not discussed mandated reporting.
“I don’t know that there would be a big pushback on that unless it requires a lot of extra work that most of us can’t afford to do,” he said. “If it’s just using what we currently have, I don’t see that anyone would have a problem with that.”
Wilson said the seven members of the sheriff’s office who were on scene during Sunday’s shooting are on paid administrative leave, which is his department’s standard practice after witnessing a death.
“We never know what we’re going to face every day when we put that badge on,” he said. “It’s an unknown every day that we go out there. With that unknown, we must be prepared. We must be well trained. We must know our jobs in order to go home at end of every day.”
Contact staff writer Tyler Jett at tjett@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6476.