Ex-boyfriend kills woman, wounds self
A few weeks ago, Charles Pepper told his daughter to buy a gun for protection.
He warned Joyce Fox that her ex-boyfriend was trouble.
Early Friday morning, that trouble followed Fox to work.
Columbus police say Danny Fabro, 54, drove to the Far West Side UPS distribution center where Fox, 50, works and shot her in the head as she was in the employee parking lot. She was pronounced dead at 12:43 p.m. Friday at Mount Carmel West hospital, according to the Franklin County coroner’s office.
“I kind of figured something like this would happen,” Pepper said of the shooting in a phone interview Friday from his home in Homestead, Florida.
UPS employees at the center, 5101 Trabue Road, called 911 about 4 a.m. A supervisor went out to Fox’s truck, parked in the back of the employee lot, and held pressure to the gunshot wound until medics arrived, according to a 911 call recording.
“Some lady’s been shot. I think she’s dead,” the supervisor says in one of two 911 calls. “Wait, wait. She’s still alive.”
Police say that Fabro fled in his truck, with witnesses giving police a description of his silver Chevrolet pickup. He was spotted by police and then led them on a chase. Officers used stop sticks to eventually disable the pickup near the intersection of West Broad Street and North Wilson Road on the West Side.
At some point, Fabro shot himself in the head, police said.
Fabro and Fox were transported in critical condition to Mount Carmel West. Fox later died there. Fabro remained in critical condition as of the last available report Friday.
Police say a relationship between Fabro and Fox ended this past November. Pepper said his daughter had broken up with Fabro after some violent episodes, including a beating last month that put her in the hospital.
County court records show he had a 2006 conviction for attempted possession of drugs, and a 1992 conviction of carrying a concealed weapon without a license.
Pepper said Fox was supposed to visit him in Florida next month. He said she has three grown children.