By Lateef Mungin and Steve Visser, Staff
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Gwinnett deputies shot and killed a 27-year-old armed man Tuesday after a three-hour standoff at his home in a quiet subdivision a few miles south of Snellville.
SWAT officers were trying to arrest the man on a DeKalb County murder warrant accusing him of the death of his best friend, who was shot Saturday, police said.
About nine hours earlier, at 6 a.m., a woman’s body was found in the parking lot of Emory-Eastside Medical Center off Ronald Reagan Parkway, police said. Police did not identify her Tuesday. Late Tuesday, police were investigating the possibility that the deaths might have been related.
“They’re hearing rumors, and they’re still trying to track it down,” said Darren Moloney, Gwinnett police spokesman. “It is going to be a lot harder now.”
The man barricaded himself in his home about noon, authorities said. The SWAT team used an armored vehicle to break the suspect’s garage door about 3:05 p.m. after negotiations failed and he would not respond to repeated phone calls, police said.
The man’s uncle was taken to the scene, but he could not persuade the man to come out. The suspect had been inside a car parked in the garage during the standoff.
The man raised a semiautomatic pistol at officers, Gwinnett Sheriff Butch Conway said, and SWAT team members opened fire. “We hate when something like this happens,” Conway said. “I’m just happy that my deputies were not shot.”
Conway said he was not sure where in DeKalb County the suspect’s friend was killed.
Arlington and Debra Glaze said the man, who they identified as Khalid Amir Nelson, was suspected of killing their 30-year-old son, Asim Glaze, in Doraville on Saturday. The Glazes said they have been life-long friends with Nelson and his family.
They said they knew that DeKalb authorities were searching for Nelson for the slaying of their son. When they heard that Nelson was locked in his home south of Snellville, they called his uncle so he could try to persuade Nelson to turn himself in.
“What I was afraid of was the police killing Khalid,” said Arlington Glaze. “He [the uncle] was there, trying to save another life.”
Glaze said he took no satisfaction in Nelson’s death, which he described as tragic for both families. “It is just another degree of depression,” Glaze said.
Copyright 2006 The Atlanta Journal-Constitution