City of Milton Has First Homicide

Man shot at Preserve at Deerfield

By MIKE MORRIS / wwwajc.com / Published on: 06/12/07

Milton police Tuesday morning were investigating the first homicide in the short history of the North Fulton town.

The shooting occurred at the Preserve at Deerfield apartment complex on Webb Road off Deerfield Parkway, about a half-mile from the Forsyth County line.

About 1:30 a.m., Fulton County 911 operators, which handle dispatch duties for Milton, received multiple calls from residents of the 636-unit complex reporting gunshots, said Bill Doughty, communications director for the city.

"At roughly the same time, Forsyth County had received a 911 call from the apparent victim, who said that he had been shot, then the line went dead," Doughty said, adding that the victim had made the call from a cell phone.

Officers searching for the victim discovered broken glass outside a unit in Building 19, and a bullet hole in a window. When they entered the apartment, they found the man lying on the floor, dead of an apparent gunshot, Doughty said.

The victim's name was not immediately released.

Doughty said the shooting was the first homicide since Milton became a city on Dec. 1. The city's 21-officer police force began operation on May 1.