Witness speaks out about restaurant deadly shooting

COLLEGE PARK, Ga. — A man is dead and three people are in custody after a fight near a south Fulton County restaurant.

College Park police said they were called to the El Ranchero restaurant on Old National Highway around 3 a.m.

Officers found one shooting victim, who was taken to Grady Memorial Hospital. Police initially said the injuries were non-life-threatening, but later Monday morning said the 22-year-old victim had died.

Channel 2's Ryan Young spoke to a woman who said she witnessed the fight that led to the man's death. She said five men were fighting when two other men tried to break it up -- that group then turned its attention to those men.

"About five black guys jumped on this Mexican boy, had him down on the ground, stomping him, beating him," the witness told Young in a phone interview.

At some point the man getting beaten found a way to run to his car.

"He got a chance to get up. He took off running. He went to the parking lot and retrieved a gun, and they were still behind him and he turned around and started shooting," the witness said.

She said the gunshots hit one of the men in the hip.

"I'm thinking he was going to live, but he was having trouble breathing," she said.

He later died at Grady Hospital. His identity has not been released.

Monday's shooting is one of several Channel 2 Action News has covered at the restaurant that sometimes acts as a club on Sunday nights.

"He asked for it because they followed him to the car, and they had beat him so badly before he got a chance to take off running and when he took off running they ran behind him," she said.

People in the area hope the incident will draw more police to put an end to crime.

WSBTV