A Georgia man is in the hospital and recovering from injuries he received after allegedly trying to carjack a construction crew on Wednesday afternoon. As it turns out, one of his intended victims was armed as well, and fired at the suspect in self-defense after repeatedly warning the man to back off. 

According to Crisp County Sheriff Billy Hancock, 40-year-old Calvin Williams, Jr. was behind the wheel of his own car when he pulled in behind a construction crew working on a highway. After stepping out of his vehicle, Williams reportedly assaulted one of the crew members with a piece of steel rebar and threatened to kill them if they didn’t hand over the keys to their truck. That’s when one of the workers drew his gun and fired. 

“[The] construction worker was saying, ‘Please stop this. If you don’t, I’m going to shoot you. Please stop,'” Hancock said. “The aggression continued and the construction worker fired one shot into the backseat of the automobile which struck the victim and the suspect.” 

In a prior incident, Sumter County authorities say they found drugs in Williams’ car. 

“They were defending themselves to keep this man from doing any bodily harm or any more bodily harm to them,” Hancock said. 

Despite the local news report, the Crisp County Sheriff’s Office stated that “authorities” found drugs in his vehicle. My guess is that they weren’t discovered until after the carjacking attempt, though that’s still a litlte unclear. It’s also unknown if Sumter County authorities had identified him as a suspect in the hit-and-run before he allegedly tried to abscond with the crew’s vehicle. 

The suspected marijuana and cocaine police say they found in Williams’ car, however, might help to explain why he thought it was a good idea to try to engage in a carjacking on a busy highway, in broad daylight, in a state that has plenty of armed citizens who regularly carry in self-defense. 

Anthony Walker is a resident in Crisp County who works near the intersection of the shooting. 

“Well, I hear about this stuff every day,” Walker said. “I found out about the carjacking today at work.”

He says if he was put in that situation, he would defend himself as well. 

“They had every right to do what they did, somebody was trying to steal their things,” Walker said. 

Well, it wasn’t just about theft. If Williams had just demanded the keys to the work truck without physically assaulting or threatening to kill the construction crew, the armed citizen wouldn’t have been justified in using lethal force. After attacking the workers, however, there was reasonable belief that the safety and lives of the crew were at stake. 

Williams was taken into custody by Crisp County deputies once they arrived on scene and was transported to a local hospital for treatment. The sheriff says he’s now facing a long list of charges, including hijacking a motor vehicle and aggravated assault. 

Both the location and the choice of victims make this an unusual carjacking, but it just goes to show that violent crime can happen anywhere and at any time. Thankfully, at least one of those road workers was armed and able to stop the attack from escalating any further and without serious injury to his coworkers.