Police officers shot, wounded serving warrant in Peach County

A man was shot and killed early Monday after exchanging gunfire with two police officers during a drug raid in Central Georgia, the GBI said.

Two Byron officers were wounded during the shooting, which occurred about 2:10 a.m., GBI spokesman J.T. Ricketson told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

Officer William Patterson was treated at Navicent Health in Macon and released, Byron police Chief Wesley Cannon told Channel 2 Action News.

The other officer, James Wynn, was seriously injured and underwent surgery.

Wynn has been with the Byron Police Department for more than four years, and Patterson has been with the department two months, Cannon said.

The officers were part of an eight-member, multi-agency drug task force serving a warrant on a home in Fort Valley, Ricketson said.

The officers knocked multiple times, he said. After getting no response, they knocked down a rear door. Five officers went into the house and three others remained along the perimeter.

“An occupant was in one room and fired at least one round and it struck two officers,” Ricketson said.

Officers returned fire, killing the alleged gunman. His name has not been released.

The man’s girlfriend and a baby were inside the home at the time of the shooting. They were not harmed, Ricketson said.

Last month, two Peach County sheriff ’s deputies were ambushed in Byron. Sgt. Patrick Sondron was pronounced dead at the county hospital, the GBI said shortly after the shooting. Deputy Daryl Smallwood died two days later. The GBI charged the alleged shooter, Ralph Stanley Elrod, with murder and aggravated assault.

Patrick Carothers, a 26-year veteran of the U.S. Marshals Service and former deputy commander of its Southeast Regional

Task Force, was fatally shot Nov. 18 while serving a fugitive with a warrant in Long County. The fugitive, Dontrell Montese Carter, was shot and killed when marshals working with Carothers returned fire.

Americus police Officer Nicholas Smarr and Georgia Southwestern State University Officer Jody Smith, who were lifelong friends, were shot when they responded to a domestic call Wednesday in Americus. Smarr died Wednesday. Smith died the following day. Minquell Kennedy Lembrick, who police said was the shooter, was found dead from a self-inflicted gunshot wound after an intense manhunt Thursday in Americus.