JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – A man was killed and a woman was hospitalized in a shooting Wednesday in Durkeeville, the Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office said.
Sgt. Mike Silcox, with the Sheriff’s Office Homicide Unit, said officers were called just before 5 p.m. to West 15th Street at Myrtle Avenue North, where they found a man and a woman who had been shot inside a gray car. The scene was a couple of blocks away from Stanton College Preparatory School.
Silcox said the man died at a hospital. Police said at a media briefing early Wednesday evening that the woman was in stable condition and was expected to survive. A friend later told News4Jax that she was in critical condition.
Friends of the man and woman identified them Alton Atmore and Heather Coffey. They said the couple had been dating for seven months and got engaged in November.
Tabitha Arnold spoke to News4Jax as she was driving to the hospital to be with Coffey.
“A friend messaged me and told me Heather (Coffey) got shot and that her fiance was dead," Arnold said. "I just couldn’t believe it. I didn’t think it was true.”
There was no information from police about the shooter. The Sheriff’s Office said it was interviewing someone at the Police Memorial Building.
The double shooting happened about 2 miles west of where a man was killed in a shooting just before 2 p.m. at 16th and Main streets in Springfield. In that case, according to the Sheriff’s Office, police believe the shooter got away in a gray, newer-model four-door Honda Civic with a Florida tag.
Silcox said the gray car in which the couple was found shot was not related to the Springfield homicide, and two shootings are not believed to be connected.