It was about 1 a.m. Wednesday when a Gwinnett County police officer patrolling a quiet park made a grisly discovery: a man and three children shot to death inside a car.
The officer was doing a routine check of Lucky Shoals Park when he spotted the vehicle on a pedestrian walkway. The park is on Britt Road, just outside Tucker.
“Recognizing that this is quite unusual to have a vehicle on a pedestrian trail, especially during the middle of the night ... the officer called out to the occupants of the vehicle and got no response,” police spokesperson Sgt. Michele Pihera told reporters at the scene.
That’s when the officer approached the car and found the bodies of a man, a boy and two girls, Pihera said. The man was in the driver’s seat, and they all appeared to have been shot.
The children were identified as Arianny Rodriguez, 13, Chadal Rodriguez, 11, and Carlos Rodriguez, 9. On Thursday, police identified the man as 56-year-old Jose Plasencia of Norcross.
According to police, the mother was at a hospital with another child who was being treated for an unrelated injury. The woman and Plasencia were parents to that child, police confirmed, but they were not in a current relationship.
Plasencia and the three other children were at the hospital when the mother agreed to let them go get something to eat while she remained with the fourth child.
“At this time, detectives are investigating this case as a possible murder-suicide, but (a) final determination will be made by the medical examiner’s office,” Pihera said.
Detectives were still at the scene around 6:30 a.m. and were focusing their investigation around a silver Honda sedan.
Police have not said if they know what led to the shooting.
— Please return to The Atlanta Journal-Constitution for updates.
