An argument between two women outside a South Carolina Kroger grocery store has left one dead and another in jail.
Investigators say the women did not know each other and got in a verbal altercation outside the store for reasons unclear to police, according to WISTV. Witnesses at the scene say they initially heard the two arguing then heard gunshots.
Police later found that Christina Harrison, 23, shot and killed Alexandria Cress Borys, 26. Lexington County Coroner Margaret Fisher confirmed that Borys succumbed to a single gunshot wound to the head and was pronounced dead shortly after the shooting.
When police arrived at the scene, they found Borys lying in a pool of blood in the store’s parking lot. Harrison fled the scene in a white Ford but turned herself in shortly after the shooting.
“Unfortunately, this is a situation where tempers flared, and someone let anger get the best of them. One rash decision has impacted the lives of two families and countless others who witnessed this tragic event,” Police Chief Bobby Dale wrote in a statement.
Harrison has been booked and charged with murder and weapon charges. Police is asking that anyone who witnessed the murder contact the Irmo Police Department.
According to EveryStat, an independent research organization that compiles evidence-based policies and statistics for public knowledge, approximately “964 people die and 2,358 are wounded by guns in South Carolina each year,” adding that “South Carolina has the 6th-highest rate of gun violence in the US.”
Furthermore, in South Carolina, “the rate of gun deaths increased 48% from 2011 to 2020, compared to a 33% increase nationwide. The rate of gun suicides increased 18% and gun homicides increased 92% compared to a 12% increase and 70% increase nationwide, respectively” and “55% of gun deaths are suicides and 42% are homicides. This is compared to 59% and 38% nationwide, respectively.”
