By Joe Johnson
An Athens gang member was recently indicted for shooting up two eastside apartments last summer.
In a 21-count indictment filled Dec. 20 in Clarke County Superior Court, 23-year-old Deuante Shermain Willingham of Baxter Street was charged with multiple counts of aggravated assault, violation of the Georgia Street Gang Prevention and Terrorism Act, and possession of a firearm during the commission of a crime.
The charging document identified Willingham as a member of the “Everybody Eats” street gan.
According to court and police records, on July 3, Willingham allegedly used a rifle to shoot at a building at Pinewood Apartments on Bailey Street, in front of which stood a woman and children.
The 46-year-old woman at the time was with her two children, ages 8 and 14, and she said that after a car pulled into the complex she heard gunfire, and “bullets started whizzing past their heads,” so she grabbed her children and ran inside, according to an Athens-Clarke County police report.
The report noted that bullets struck the exterior of two occupied apartments, entering one of them.
No one was reported injured.
ACCPD spokesman Lt. Shaun Barnett said the occupants of the apartments and the woman standing outside had no known gang affiliations.
Officers collected from the scene 19 spent shell casings for high-power rifle bullets, according to the police report.
The indictment identified the weapon that Willingham allegedly used as an AR-15 assault style rifle.
After an investigation by ACCPD detectives, Willingham was arrested on warrants on Sept. 26, and he remains incarcerated at the county jail without bail having been set.
Willingham is scheduled to be arraigned Feb. 6 on the indictment.