ATLANTA — A 26-year-old British immigrant and former U.S. Navy service member who obtained American citizenship in 2022 is now facing serious criminal charges for a string of coordinated violent attacks that left three people dead or injured, including a U.S. Department of Homeland Security employee, and spread fear across residential and commercial areas of Atlanta’s northern and eastern suburbs.
Olaolukitan Adon Abel, whose name is documented in multiple spelling variations across official court and government records, stands accused of two counts of murder and one count of aggravated assault, along with additional firearms violations, for the series of shootings and stabbings that unfolded in the early hours of Monday. Authorities confirmed the attacks, which spanned nearly 20 miles across three different jurisdictions, are definitively linked, and at least one of the victims is believed to have been targeted at random.
The wave of violence began shortly after 1 a.m. in Decatur, where local police responded to reports of gunfire near a neighborhood restaurant and found 31-year-old Prianna Weathers suffering from multiple gunshot wounds. Despite urgent transport to a regional trauma center, Weathers died from her injuries, DeKalb County Police Chief Gregory Padrick confirmed.
Roughly one hour later, roughly 19 kilometers northwest of the first attack in Brookhaven, a 49-year-old homeless man was shot multiple times while sleeping outside of a local grocery store. Brookhaven Police Chief Brandon Gurley said the unnamed man remains in critical condition at an area hospital as of Tuesday.
The final attack was discovered more than five hours later, approximately 16 kilometers south of the Brookhaven incident in Panthersville, where 40-year-old Lauren Bullis, a DHS Office of Inspector General employee, was found with gunshot and stab wounds while out walking her dog around 7 a.m. Bullis died at the scene, Padrick said.
Bullis, who served DHS for years in multiple roles including auditor and innovation team lead, has been remembered by colleagues and family as a deeply kind, generous public servant. “She brought a genuine sense of care to her colleagues each day,” DHS wrote in an official social media tribute following her death. Her family added in a statement that Bullis loved running, reading and traveling, and “her warmth and generosity touched everyone surrounding her.” Ashley Toillion, a fellow DHS auditor based in Denver, called Bullis “the nicest, sweetest, most encouraging person I’ve ever met.”
Court and military records paint a troubling picture of the suspect’s history in the U.S. armed forces and prior run-ins with law enforcement. Adon Abel enlisted in the U.S. Navy in 2020, and was most recently stationed with the Helicopter Maritime Strike Squadron in Coronado, California, where he held the rank of petty officer and even received a Navy “E” Ribbon for superior performance in battle readiness.
But court records from California show Adon Abel pleaded guilty just last October to charges of assaulting two police officers with a deadly weapon and attacking a third civilian while stationed at the Coronado base. Additional court records from Chatham County, Georgia, show that a person matching Adon Abel’s name and birth date pleaded guilty to four misdemeanor counts of sexual battery in June 2024. DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin, a member of President Donald Trump’s second cabinet, called the deadly attacks “acts of pure evil” and publicly raised questions about how Adon Abel was granted U.S. citizenship in 2022, during Democratic President Joe Biden’s administration. Under longstanding U.S. immigration rules, people convicted of most violent felonies are strictly barred from obtaining naturalized citizenship, and it remains unclear whether Adon Abel had any criminal convictions on his record prior to his 2022 citizenship approval.
Following his arrest, Adon Abel faces charges including malice murder, aggravated assault, and unlawful firearms possession. He waived his right to an initial court appearance on Tuesday, and the public defender assigned to his case has not yet responded to requests for comment on the charges.