Holly MatkinMurfreesboro, TN – A father and son who witnessed a shooting on the interstate Saturday afternoon chased after the fleeing gunman in order to provide his vehicle information to police.
The attack occurred on Interstate 24 just before 1 p.m. on March 6, WSMV reported.
Carl Bauer said he and his son, Dale, were driving down the road near exit 840 when the shooting unfolded right in front of them.
“The next thing I know, the window comes down, and his arm comes out,” Bauer told WSMV. “I could see the gun, and the next thing I see are shell casings being popped out.”
The vehicle the victim was riding in swerved to the side of the road just as off-duty Chattanooga Fire Department Captain Brad Petty was approaching the scene, according to WSMV.
“He started waving his hands,” Petty said of the driver of the vehicle that was shot at. “You could tell by the expression on his face the fear and the panic that it was something bad.”
Petty jumped out of his vehicle and ran to the car, where he found the gunshot victim.
“She was struggling to breathe because of the way she was laying so I set her up and opened up her airways, and she was breathing pretty good then,” he told WSMV.
Investigators later said the suspects in the vehicle intentionally targeted the 19-year-old female victim, who is not expected to survive, WKRN reported.
The wounded woman was airlifted to a local hospital after the attack, according to WSMV.
After witnessing the shooting, Bauer knew he had to do something to help police catch the gunman.
“When he bailed off to the right, for some reason, my natural instinct was [to] follow him,” he told WSMV.
The driver of the fleeing 2011 silver Cadillac was later identified as 20-year-old Keyonn Warfield, according to WKRN.
A second man, 19-year-old Rizighallah Khemis, was also in the vehicle at the time of the shooting.
The Good Samaritan called 911 and provided the dispatcher with an up-to-the-second account of where the suspect vehicle was going, WSMV reported.
“He was weaving and dodging and driving very erratic,” Bauer recalled, according to WSMV. “I’m giving a live feed, as far as where he’s going, what bridge we’re crossing over.”
He chased the shooter for about five minutes before he lost him in a residential area, according to the news outlet.
But by that time, he had snagged the suspect’s license plate number and passed it along to police.
“I knew the car,” Bauer told WSMV. “If I had saw it again, I would have known it was it.”
Rutherford County Sheriff’s Office (RCSO) deputies later arrested Warfield and Khemis, WKRN reported.
@RCTNSheriff detective charges suspect Keyonn Warfield, 20, with attempted murder of woman Saturday on I-24. He and Rizighallah Khemis, 19, charged with conspiracy.
Victim Rickiya Compton, 19, of La Vergne remains critical.
Suspects held at Rutherford County Detention Center. pic.twitter.com/ZEZtGjDMm7
— RCTNSheriff (@RCTNSheriff) March 8, 2021
Warfield has been charged with attempted murder, and Khemis has been charged with conspiracy to commit attempted murder.
They both also face a charge of unlawful possession of a weapon while committing a dangerous felony.
Investigators said Warfield fired six to eight rounds at the 19-year-old victim during the attack, WKRN reported.
According to court documents, Warfield is a known gang member who targeted the woman because she allegedly got into a fight with Warfield’s juvenile cousin in February.
Investigators said the 19-year-old woman and her twin sister allegedly flashed guns at the juvenile “as a form of intimidation,” according to Warfield’s arrest warrant.
The woman, who was shot in the head, suffered a “non-survivable gunshot wound that caused damage to her spinal cord,” according to detectives.
The victim was still on life support at the time of the suspects’ arrests, WKRN reported.
