Two Georgia Teens Charged With Murder in Snellville Shooting Death

Glenn Fitzpatrick, 18, of Winder and Michael Coker, 18, of Loganville were charged with murder and booked without bond eleven days after the shooting death of Taveus Threatt Jr., 19, on the 2900 block of Spruce Circle in unincorporated Snellville.

Gwinnett County Police Homicide detectives announced the arrests on March 24, tracing the investigation's arc back to the 911 calls that first drew officers to Spruce Circle on March 13. Responding patrol officers found Threatt's body; the Crime Scene Unit then moved in for evidence collection before homicide detectives built the case that led to Fitzpatrick and Coker.

Both face four charges: felony murder, malice murder, aggravated assault, and possession of a firearm during the commission of a felony. The pairing of malice murder and felony murder is a deliberate prosecutorial hedge. Malice murder requires proof of intentional killing. Felony murder attaches when a death results from the commission of another serious offense, such as the aggravated assault count also listed in the filing. Carrying both theories into court gives prosecutors alternate paths to conviction if one proves harder to sustain against either defendant at trial.

Neither Fitzpatrick nor Coker was granted bond at booking. Tried as adults, a murder conviction in Georgia carries mandatory minimums that could mean decades behind bars for two defendants who were 18 at the time of the alleged offense.

GCPD characterized the Spruce Circle shooting as an isolated act with no ongoing threat to the broader public, though detectives simultaneously called for additional tips, a detail that suggests investigators are still assembling a complete picture of what happened that evening even with two arrests in hand.

Pretrial discovery will test how much of the case holds under defense scrutiny. Attorneys for Fitzpatrick and Coker are expected to contest forensic linkage to the scene, witness reliability, and what the evidence can establish about each defendant's state of mind on March 13.