Father Shot Three Times in Front of His Wife and Children by Teen Robbers Who Knocked on Their Door
Joel Christie, Daily Mail, August 24, 2015
An Atlanta couple have told of the terrifying moment four men pretending to have had car troubles burst into their home and robbed them at gunpoint, shooting the father-of-two in front of his children.
Mike and Whitney Lash had just returned to their house with their two young children on August 16 when the men knocked on their door.
The Lash family.
Mr Lash answered the door, and the men said they had just moved down the street but had a flat tire and wanted to borrow a jack, but Mrs Lash felt something was amiss from the start.
‘I had a feeling that it was an excuse and we were about to be robbed. Right about that moment I saw them pull the gun on Mike,’ she told ABC News.
As Mr Lash saw the gun, he tried to slam the door shut, but two other men suddenly appeared.
Mr Lash was shot three times in the his right leg as he attempted to keep the men out of his house.
The four men then forced their way in.
Mr Lash believed the gang were going to kill him and started praying.
‘Lord, this is, I guess, the moment I will meet you today . . . if it is not your will, I am ready to stay,’ he recalled.
Mrs Lash grabbed the couple’s six-month-old daughter, Lucy, and the phone and ran into the yard calling 911.
Their other child, two-year-old Everson, was upstairs sleeping.
‘I heard footsteps of someone running and two more shots that were aimed at me and my daughter,’ Mrs Lash told ABC.
The intruder then caught up to her and the child and brought them back into the house.
The four men detained the family and proceeded to steal items from the house.
‘It just went like a silent movie,’ Mr Lash recalled.
‘They started walking in and I remember them coming in and out multiple times, just bringing stuff from our house.’
The gang eventually left with the loot.
Mrs Lash and the children were not harmed, and Mr Lash was rushed to hospital to remove the bullets from his leg.
The couple were able to work with police to provide sketches of their alleged assailants.
The sketches lead to the arrest of Brandon Jerome Smith, 18, on Thursday.
Brandon Jerome Smith
Police are still searching for the other three robbers.
They have appealed to the men to turn themselves in.
The Lash family say they are just grateful the incident wasn’t any more threatening.
‘We really do value every moment we have together now and are just so thankful to have our family be safe and we are all closer than ever,’ Mrs Lash said in the interview.
