Police Blotter

Five arrested in Grovetown killing

//

Five Augusta teenagers were arrested Wednesday in the fatal shooting of a Grovetown man during what police described as a home invasion.

Authorities arrested Willie Bernard Butler, 19; Martin Holmes, 17; Karnbi Octavious Young, 19; Patrick Booker, 19; and a 14-year-old boy whose identity was not released because of his age. They were charged with murder in the shooting death of 33-year-old Ricky Gibson.

All five also are charged with kidnapping, armed robbery and burglary, officials said.

Columbia County Coroner Vernon Collins said Gibson was pronounced dead at 3:29 a.m. after being shot several times in his home on Williams Street.

Collins said Gibson's girlfriend and a baby escaped just before Gibson was shot. Neither the woman nor the baby was hit by bullets fired in her direction as she fled the single-wide mobile home.

The investigation is being conducted by the Georgia Bureau of Investigation and the Grovetown Department of Public Safety. GBI special agent in charge Gary Nicholson said that he didn't yet know the reason behind Gibson's death.

The body was taken to the state crime lab in Augusta for autopsy, Collins said.

Gibson's death is the first homicide in Columbia County in 2008.

The following accounts were taken from reports from the Columbia County Sheriff's Office. Additional reports are available at www.columbiacountyso.org:

Augustan charged with kidnapping

Police arrested an Augusta man on a kidnapping charge Monday. He is accused of taking his 1-year-old daughter from her Evans home without permission from his girlfriend.

The 30-year-old woman told police that Ashford Elijah Bush, 23, had come by her house and asked her many times whether he could take his daughter and that she had refused him. She said he placed the girl into his Chevrolet Impala and left.

Police found Bush in a neighbor's front yard. He told them that though he was told not to take his daughter, he had been allowed to do so in the past.

Bush was taken to the Columbia County Detention Center and held for simple battery, kidnapping and criminal trespass, according to jail records.

Phone, cash taken from handbag

A teacher at Hope Christian School in Martinez told police Monday that she noticed that items were missing from her purse.

The 41-year-old said that she had hidden her purse in a storage space of a bookcase in her classroom. After lunch, she saw her cell phone case in a trash can. Her Motorola phone and $45 were missing She said she had seen them in the purse that morning.

Vehicle stolen from Grovetown stables

A manager of Canterbury Stables called police Monday morning after a recreational vehicle was stolen from Canterbury Trails in Grovetown.

The 22-year-old told police that someone had stolen a 2004 360 Prairie Kawasaki worth $3,000.