ATLANTA — A search is over for a man accused of murdering a pregnant woman and her unborn child.
Police said Devin Anthony pulled the trigger.
The murder happened early on Tuesday morning at an apartment complex on Peppertree Circle in DeKalb County.
Police said Anthony fired a flurry of shots through a window, hitting Shakiya Pridgen, 23, inside, killing her and her unborn child.
“She was a loving, sweet, caring person with a good heart. Somebody took the life of my daughter,” her father, Paco Pridgen, said.
Anthony made his first appearance on Wednesday, charged in the shooting deaths of Shakiya Pridgen and her unborn son.
The victim’s mother told Channel 2’s Tom Regan that Anthony was an ex-boyfriend of her daughter and the father of her now deceased unborn child.
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“I want the world to know that somebody took a blessing. A blessing from all of us,” mother Verdina Scott said.
Channel 2 Action News has learned authorities revoked Anthony’s probation in February after he failed a drug test.
Documents we obtained show a Fulton County grand jury indicted Anthony in September 2021 for murder in the shooting death of a man.
Another document shows he later struck a negotiated plea deal under Georgia’s First Offender Act, which reduced the murder charge to manslaughter.
A judge sentenced him to 20 years in prison with 11 months to serve, with the balance of the 19 years to be on probation.
Pridgen’s family spent the day making funeral arrangements for her and her unborn child.
They told Regan that if Anthony were still in prison, their daughter would be alive today.
“He got a second chance. Shakiya doesn’t get a second chance. And he shouldn’t be allowed a third to do it to somebody else. He should have never been let out,” Scott said.
“I don’t understand if you murder somebody, you just get probation,” Paco Pridgen said.
A GoFundMe account has been set up to help the family with funeral arrangements and other expenses.
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