On July 18, 2008, Genai Coleman was sitting in her car near a transit station reading her Bible when a man with a gun approached her.
The attacker, who had just exited a petrol station across the street, pointed his weapon at her and told her to get out of her gold Dodge Stratus. He shot the 40-year-old woman in the chest, pulled her out of the car and fled.
Coleman, a native of Gwinnett County, Georgia, did not succeed.
The murder is being investigated in Oxygen’s true-crime series, “The Real Murders of Atlanta.” It examines “shocking, sinful and salacious cases” in the “metropolitan mecca of music, entertainment and technology.” It includes interviews with loved ones, investigators and others involved with the case.
Genai Coleman was killed on July 18, 2008. She was 40. The Navy reservist was shot in her car outside an Atlanta mall. (oxygen)
Brittany Barrington, Crime Scene Supervisor of the Gwinnett County Police Department, Was at the scene.
“It’s a crime of opportunity,” Barrington told Fox News Digital. “She was doing what people do every day, and I do it sometimes too — everybody does it. You’re just sitting in your car looking at your phone, not paying attention, just being in a random parking spot. He took advantage of that. It’s really a crime of opportunity. She needed his car, and he was going to get it.”
Coleman’s family later contacted police, concerned that the punctual mother of three adopted children never returned home. Investigators confirmed that Coleman was the victim.
The episode revealed that Coleman was a beloved school teacher and soon-to-be grandmother.
Jenai Coleman was a beloved school teacher from Georgia and soon to be a grandmother. She is seen here with a close friend. (oxygen)
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Barrington said while Coleman was parked near a popular mall, the crime scene was “minimal.” There was a pool of blood and no suspects.
“All the key evidence that could have provided immediate clues had disappeared,” she said. “The most important thing to me was that the car was missing. There was no shell casing on the ground. And we knew shots had been fired. So I immediately suspected that maybe a shell had been left in the car. Maybe the shell had been picked up. Maybe the gun used was a revolver, so no shells would have been left behind.”
There was a witness.
Genai Coleman was waiting for her daughter to get off work when she was attacked by a stranger. (oxygen)
According to the episode, a bus driver described how he saw a man approach the driver’s side of the vehicle, and call Coleman a “motherfucker.” He heard a gunshot and saw the man pull Coleman out of the car and throw him to the ground.
Coleman’s car was found parked in a parking lot about 40 miles away. A cigarette butt was found on the floor of the car.
“The small chance finding of a cigarette butt provided a significant amount of DNA information,” Barrington said. “That immediately opened up a new aspect of the investigation.”
The cigarettes were submitted for DNA testing.
The episode also explained how detectives reviewed surveillance footage and spotted a man buying a pack of cigarettes – Bronson Lights – from a gas station. The Bronson filters matched those found on the recovered cigarette butt. The same man was also seen walking through a parking lot that was located about 15 feet from where the vehicle was dumped.
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A cigarette butt was found inside Jenai Coleman’s car. Family members confirmed that Coleman did not smoke. (Oyxgen)
The DNA results came in and Donald Smith was identified.
According to investigators, Smith He had previously been charged with armed robbery, That made him a “definite suspect.” They obtained his cellphone records and found that his phone had pinged towers near the crime scene on the night of the murder. He looked just like the man seen on the surveillance.
Police were pretty sure they had their killer. But when Smith was brought in for questioning, he insisted he never saw Coleman or his car. When police told him they had his DNA, Smith replied, “So what?”
“My DNA can’t be in that car because I never got in it,” Smith said.
An eyewitness, who was a bus driver, heard the gunshot. He then saw a man pulling Genai Coleman out of her car. (oxygen)
Smith was then shown the surveillance footage.
“That’s definitely not me,” he said.
Smith said the cell phone number police obtained belonged to his brother — an identical twin.
“Donald and Ronald — he’s my twin brother,” Smith said.
Barrington said murder cases involving identical twins are “extremely rare.”
“This is the only major homicide the department has had involving identical twins,” he reported. “Since then, I have not had any additional crime scenes that involved identical twins. It was a unique experience. . . . You don’t usually deal with that. It’s usually the same person, or you have twins, but they’re fraternal twins. But the uniqueness of identical twins is very rare.”
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The fingerprints found by police belonged to Ronald Smith. (oxygen)
Smith initially refused to blame his brother Ronald Smith, who also lives in Gwinnett County, but he later confirmed that the man in the surveillance video was Ronald.
Apart from the cigarette butt, fingerprints were also taken from the car. These will help in identifying which twin did the deed.
“Even if you’re an identical twin, the characteristics of your fingerprints are what distinguish you from your siblings,” Barrington said. “That’s what helped us figure out which brother had his handprint on the roof of Gennai’s car, so we could identify which brother was the real suspect.”
The fingerprints matched Ronald’s.
Ronald was arrested. later confessed to Coleman’s murder and took his car and abandoned it there. They claimed the shooting was “an accident.”
“It was a very loud explosion,” Ronald claimed in the Oxygen series. “I tried to take a car at gunpoint. The gun went off.”
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In October 2012, Ronald was convicted on charges of murder, aggravated battery, aggravated assault, motor vehicle hijacking, and possession of a weapon during the commission of a felony. Gwinnett Daily Post It was reported that he was sentenced to life imprisonment plus 25 years of imprisonment.
Barrington said a crime like this “can happen to anybody at any time.”
“Be aware of your surroundings. Also, know that the detectives, the police department, anybody who’s investigating, they’re passionate about getting justice. They want to help,” he warned.
“There’s an emotional toll. There’s a professional toll. But that’s why we’re here. That’s why we exist,” Barrington said.
“The Real Murders of Atlanta” airs Saturday nights at 9 p.m.
