Family mourns loss of woman killed in murder-suicide at Long Co. gas station

LONG COUNTY, Ga. (WTOC) - The family of a Savannah woman who was shot and killed at a Long County gas station shared memories of their loved one.

Ludowici Police say 32-year-old Marquel Williams shot 47-year-old Tashkia Jones before turning the gun on himself on May 16. Both Williams and Jones later died at the hospital.

Shakurri Jones looks at photos of her mother, Tashika, while wrapped in a blanket that once belonged to her.

“She was basically my best friend. I could talk to her about anything,” Jones said.

Shakurri and her grandmother, both remembering Tashika, as a caring mother and daughter.

“She helped everybody, I mean everybody. It didn’t matter who you were,” Tashika’s mother, Shadron Abraham said.

When both women received the call that Tashika had been seriously injured in a shooting at a gas station in Ludowici, they couldn’t believe it.

“I thought someone was just joking around. I said don’t play with me like that. Then, it set in what had happened, I got nervous, I don’t even know how to explain it.”

Abraham says Tashika was engaged to the shooter, Marquel Williams, but she had broken off the engagement just days before the shooting.

“It was hard to understand how someone would want to hurt her… when all she wanted was to help people.”

Tashika leaves behind her mother, three adult daughters and multiple grandchildren.

“It’s a big hole to fill. Especially because she was mine and my sister’s best friends. I just feel like now, I have to be their best friend.”

Above all else, Tashika’s family wants her to be remembered for the person she was.

“I don’t want people to remember how she left here. I want them to remember how she was the whole time she was here.”

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