Troy Marquise Gillard (Greensboro Police Dept.), Kathryn Garton Holmes and authorities investigating the fatal shooting (WGHP/YouTube screenshots)
A 31-year-old man in North Carolina has been arrested after he allegedly killed a 67-year-old woman, gunning her down as she was driving to meet him after the two set up a transaction through an online marketplace. Troy Marquise Gillard was taken into custody on Wednesday and charged with first-degree murder in the fatal shooting of Kathryn Garton Holmes, authorities announced.
In addition to murder, Gillard is also facing counts of robbery with a firearm or dangerous weapon, discharging a firearm into occupied property, being a felon in possession of a firearm, and being a fugitive from justice, records show.
According to the Greensboro Police Department, officers on May 24 responded to a possible shooting and car crash in the 500 block of Denny Road, about 95 miles northwest of Charlotte, North Carolina. Upon arriving at the scene, first responders found Holmes’ car crashed into a ditch. She appeared to be suffering from a gunshot wound to the neck.
Holmes was taken to a hospital, where she succumbed to her injuries and was pronounced dead two days later.
Police said that Holmes “had traveled to that location on Denny Road for a planned transaction arranged through an online marketplace site” when she was shot by Gillard. Holmes intended to sell something to Gillard, though it was not immediately clear what item Gillard had agreed to purchase.
According to a report from High Point, North Carolina, Fox affiliate WGHP, as Holmes was driving her 2022 Volkswagen Toas SUV when the bullet struck her in the neck, leaving her paralyzed. She was then unable to take her foot off the accelerator, which caused her to drive into the ditch and crash.
A copy of the arrest warrant obtained by the News & Record said that Gillard stole Holmes’ engagement ring and wedding band, valued at $10,515.
A short while after Holmes was shot, someone reported seeing a suspicious person entering an unoccupied home near the site of the shooting, WGHP reported. Officers searched the home and found that it was unoccupied. However, investigators determined that Gillard had a familial connection to the unoccupied home.
The Greensboro Police’s Violent Criminal Apprehension Team, working alongside the Winston-Salem Police Department, located Gillard on Wednesday and took him into custody.
The shooting is not Gillard’s first run-in with the law. In 2016, he pleaded guilty to one count of first-degree felony carjacking, court records show.
Gillard is being held in the Guilford County Jail without bond and is scheduled to appear in court again on Oct. 1.
If convicted, Gillard faces a possible life sentence without the opportunity for parole or the death penalty.
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