MEMPHIS, Tenn. — Two families are learning to live without their loved ones after police say two friends were shot and killed on the interstate.
January 9 was a day that a senseless act of violence took someone that Christie Fullerton and Erma Norman both loved. For Christie, it was her husband Jonathan Fullerton. For Erma, it was her son Eric Lesure.
Jonathan and Eric were heading to a party together when someone started shooting at them just after midnight near I-240 and Millbranch.
“Somebody was shooting at them and it started from the back,” Fullerton said. “Like they was shooting at them on the expressway, and they proceeded to the side because the car is riddled with bullets.”
Investigators said the car crashed a short time later, and both men were ejected from the car. Officers said when they arrived, they thought they were responding to an accident until they noticed both men were shot.
Both men died from their injuries.
“They don’t know if it was road rage or somebody was shooting from the back, and they just shot at the vehicle,” Fullerton said.
Fullerton also said she could feel something was wrong when she tried calling her husband and he did not answer. Norman was fighting the same feeling when she was trying to reach her son.
“I got a call from his friend,” Norman said. “She was telling me that Eric didn’t come home.”
That’s when Norman started worrying. Moments later, her grandson called to say Eric’s best friend, Jonathan, had been shot.
“Then he called me back and said, ‘Grand mama our daddy is dead,'” Norman said. “I wasn’t ready to hear that.”
Norman said when police called her hours later, she kept asking if her son was dead, but police would not tell her. When she walked into the police station, she saw her son’s cellphone sitting on the table with Fullerton’s cellphone and that is when she knew they were both gone.
“I just wasn’t ready to hear it, but I knew in my heart he was gone before I got down there,” Norman said.
If you know who killed Jonathan Fullerton and Eric Lesure, you are urged to call CrimeStoppers at (901)-528-CASH. Your tip could help put a dangerous criminal behind bars and $2,000 in your pocket.
All calls are confidential.
