Mug shot of Tommy Savage from a 2011 Habersham County DUI arrest
A suspected shooter who eluded authorities for more than six hours Tuesday morning is now in custody. Habersham County Sheriff Joey Terrell says Tommy Savage was apprehended inside his home at 1722 Garrison Road around 11 a.m. without incident.
Savage was being sought in connection with an early morning domestic shooting that left one man dead and another man injured. The victim’s names have not been released.
Terrell says Savage is known to authorities as a ‘survivalist’ who stays armed and stocked with ammunition. His daughter Celia was arrested in Habersham County in May 2012 for making and possessing pipe bombs. She later pleaded guilty after reaching a plea agreement with prosecutors.
Suspect surrenders to bomb robot
Terrell says Tuesday’s incident began around 2 a.m. when officers responded to a call about a domestic dispute at Savage’s home. When officers arrived he says they were told everything was fine and the officers left. They were called back to the scene two hours later.
“About 4 a.m. there was a call from a neighbor’s house that someone had been shot and possibly someone was deceased,” Terrell says. At that point, officers returned to the scene along with first responders. They found one man dead and transported an uninjured woman and a man with a gunshot wound to his arm, to the hospital. Terrell says both were treated and released and taken to the Sheriff’s Office for questioning by the GBI.
At one point Savage was believed to be hiding in the woods behind his house. Officers set up a perimeter between Garner and Pea Ridge Roads. K-9 units were deployed and a Georgia State Patrol chopper with heat sensing devices was called in to determine if there were any bodies outside the house.
Sheriff Terrell says the GSP SWAT team was called in because of Savage’s known history of being heavily armed. “Every time we’ve dealt with this individual,” Terrell says, “we know that he totes a .45 on his hip, he has a shotgun and he has a AR-15. And he has lots of ammo. He’s bragged about having lots of ammo.”
The GBI bomb squad was called in due to the previous pipe bomb incident involving Savage’s daughter and while they were clearing the house with a bomb robot, Savage surrendered. “He actually surrendered to the bomb robot so the officers didn’t have to confront him face to face, which is an awesome thing,” says Terrell.
The 56-year old Savage, who was uninjured, was taken into custody without incident. He was transported to Habersham Medical Center for evaluation then take to the Habersham County Detention Center. The GBI is investigating the shooting. Charges are pending.
Level Grove Elementary and South Habersham Middle Schools were placed on soft lockdown while the manhunt was underway. Superintendent of Schools Matthew Cooper says authorities kept him informed and the students were never in any danger. The scene of the shooting and search was several miles from those schools. Students were kept inside and a Habersham County deputy was posted outside each of the schools at Cooper’s request “just as a precaution.”
As of 7 p.m. Tuesday officials still had not released the victims’ names.
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Original article: Suspect in Fatal Cornelia Shooting Captured.