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Family desperate for answers in murder of metro Atlanta teen found in cemetery

LAMAR COUNTY, Ga. — A family is torn up after their teenaged loved one left home to go to work and was found dead in a cemetery dozens of miles away.

The family of D’Shaunti Hunter, 17, says they need answers. They’re asking anyone with information to come forward.

“We got along perfect. I love her so much.” That’s how Jazmine Johnson described her relationship with her 17 year old niece, D’Shaunti.

Johnson said her niece had dreams of going places. The teen’s family can’t understand how she ended up more than 50 miles away from her Ellenwood home, dead in a Lamar County cemetery.

“This is crushing us. They stole from us. This is wrong. This is way more than wrong,” Johnson said.

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Johnson said she talked to D’Shaunti Friday via Instagram. She was on the way to work. Then Saturday, the family realized no one had heard from her.

“It was a panic, OK. We haven’t heard from Shaunti later on Saturday. They discovered her body on Sunday,” Johnson explained.

“She was lying right here on her back. Her clothes were still on,” Lamar County Sheriff Brad White told Channel 2′s Tom Jones.

White said a family visiting their loved one’s gravesite on High Falls Road noticed something strange. They quickly realized it was a body. Someone shot D’Shaunti.

Jones asked the sheriff if someone drove her there or walked her back to the location where her body was found.

“No. We had tire tracks. We feel quite confident that they drove her back here,” White quickly responded.

The question now is why.

Johnson wants anyone who knows who her niece was with and why to give officers a call.

“And why did she end up at a place she wasn’t supposed to be instead of work. That would really, really, really, really help us,” she said.

White says his investigators have several people they’d like to speak with, and they are actively searching for them. He told Jones that he felt confident this crime will be solved.