WARNER ROBINS, Ga. — A man walked into a Warner Robins Popeyes hoping to get a job. But that evening, he didn’t walk away with a new gig; instead, a man unloaded nine rounds at him.
Now, the man accused of carrying out the shooting, Matthew Patterson, was convicted by a Houston County jury on Tuesday, according to Houston County District Attorney William Kendall.
“These cases where gun violence is used to solve matters between people is just senseless,” Kendall said in a press release. “The lives of our citizens should be protected and evildoers who resort to senseless gun violence to solve their problems have only one place to go—prison.”
They say it all stems from Thomas Hickey’s attempt to get a job at the Popeyes location on Russell Parkway on Sept. 9, 2019.
Hickey went into the location to get a job application but, with the restaurant about to close, he went out to his car to finish the application.
While he was out in his car, that is when Patterson apparently entered the situation, the district attorney’s office said.
They say Patterson approached Hickey with a codefendant, Troy Lewis, Jr, and they began harassing him, telling him to leave the area. At that point, Hickey pulled out his phone and started “recording the harassment,” the district attorney’s office said.
When Hickey left the area, they say a witness at a nearby business saw Patterson fire a handgun at Hickey’s car, unloading at least nine bullets at the man. Hickey’s vehicle was hit three times during the shooting.
Hickey was not injured.
Lewis and Patterson then are accused of fleeing into the woods nearby but would soon be arrested by the Warner Robins Police Department, the district attorney’s office said.
The pair are accused of hiding the .9mm rounds in the woods, but authorities would eventually then find the round.
On Tuesday, Patterson was convicted in a two-day jury trial on aggravated assault, and criminal damage to property charges
The judge overseeing the trial, Houston Superior Court Judge G.E. “Bo” Adams, sentenced Patterson to 12 years in prison, and he will then serve 13 years of probation afterwards, the District Attorney’s Office said.
Patterson’s codefendant, Lewis, testified against him during the trial. The DA’s Office says that Lewis’ charges are still pending over four years after the shooting took place.
The case was prosecuted by Senior Assistant District Attorney Sandra Matson and Assistant District Attorney Brian Huckaby.
Matson said that the shooting reflected Patterson’s “criminal disregard for human life.”
“The people of Houston County need to know that the type of behavior exhibited in this case—where one party escalates a verbal dispute to the point of senseless and unjustifiable gun violence—will not be tolerated in this community,” Matson said.
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