Police reveal new details in shooting of teen

Published 10:47 am Thursday, July 20, 2023

New information has surfaced regarding the shooting earlier this week of a Milledgeville teen who remains hospitalized in Atlanta, The Union-Recorder has learned.

Milledgeville Police Department Maj. Linc Boyer, commander of the road patrol division, said the shooting of 15-year-old Caden Bridges shortly before 5 p.m. Tuesday was committed by an assailant wearing a camouflage mask.

“The masked gunman walked up to the victim and said, ‘Hey man, what cha doing’ before he fired a handgun,” Boyer told the newspaper.

Just as the gunman walked up on the victim as he was working on a four-wheeler in the front yard of his residence on Grandview Drive, he left in the same manner following the shooting.

Boyer said the shooting was witnessed by some children who were playing in the neighborhood.

Bridges was shot once in his right side.

Firefighters/first responders with Milledgeville Fire Rescue Services and personnel with Grady Emergency Medical Services treated him at the scene. He was later taken by ambulance to the emergency department at Atrium Health Navicent, The Medical Center in Macon where he received treatment before he was transferred to Children’s Egleston Hospital in Atlanta where he remains in serious condition.

After the shooting, road patrol officers and detectives with the Milledgeville Police Department converged on the area looking for the suspect and any evidence that might help solve the case.

Boyer said officers turned up no trace of the suspect in the area.

“We were able to find a shell casing that came from the bullet fired from the handgun that the suspect used,” Boyer said.

The shell casing was found in the victim’s front yard.

“It was actually located about 20 yards from the roadway of Grandview Drive,” Boyer said.

Since the shooting, Detective Lt. Everett January has conducted several interviews and is running down leads in the case in hopes they will lead to an arrest, Boyer said.

Police are asking that anyone with information about the shooting to call the police department at 478-414-4090 or Macon Regional Crimestoppers at 478-742-2330.