The Newton County district attorney said Tuesday he will seek the death penalty against Lanny Barnes, accused of killing a 2-year-old child and injuring four other people by driving over them outside a McDonald's restaurant in May.
District Attorney Ken Wynne formally notified Barnes' lawyers at a brief hearing Tuesday morning. In an interview afterward he declined comment on the reasons for his decision because "it gets into matters of evidence."
Police said Barnes repeatedly ran over two adult sisters and their three children as as they left a McDonald's on U.S. 278 in Covington on May 23. Avery Nicole King died the next day. She and her mother, Anita King, had traveled from North Carolina to visit her sister, Stephanie Casola of Covington. Casola and her two sons, ages 3 and 4, also were injured.
Barnes, who since has been diagnosed with leukemia, is being held without bond on charges including murder and aggravated assault.
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Angry Woman Gets Revenge at McDonald's: ATHENS, Ga., Aug. 15, 2006
(AP) Police have been looking for a disgruntled McDonald's customer who ran into two other customers with her car after a dispute over who was next in line.
Melinda Ann Thomas, 34, and Linda Ann Thomas, 51, were standing in a crowded line around 8:30 a.m. Saturday as they waited to order breakfast, police said. A cashier opened a new line and they stepped to the front of it _ a move that angered another customer who was waiting to order.
According to the report, the unidentified woman started yelling at them and threatened to kill them.
The woman then left the restaurant before the Thomases and stayed in the parking lot, sitting in her dark blue Jeep Cherokee, witnesses told police. As the Thomases made their way to their car, witnesses said the woman pulled out of her parking space and sped toward the women, striking them both with the passenger side of the Jeep.
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