DOUGLAS COUNTY, Ga. — Editor's note: An alert to this story said there were 60 charges the fifth suspect faces in connection to the shooting. He actually faces 80 charges.
A fifth person has been arrested in connection to a shooting last month at a Sweet 16 party in Douglasville sent a panic into a huge crowd of teens and left two innocent bystanders dead.
Authorities in Douglas County on Tuesday confirmed the arrest of 21-year-old Takhel Smart in connection to the case. According to Douglas County Jail records, his charges include two counts of murder, nine counts of aggravated assault, nine counts of aggravated battery, 40 counts of participation in criminal gang activity and 20 counts relating to being party to a crime.
The four previous arrests, all announced last month, included three 17-year-olds and an 18-year-old. All face murder charges and additional counts.
Investigators believe the shooting may have been a gang retaliation incident, with Sheriff Tim Pounds noting last month that the victims - 14-year-old Ajanaye Hill and 15-year-old Samuel Moon, were "not the intended targets."
Authorities said that there were more than 100 teenagers at the party off Sitka Drive and Talkeetna Road. Aside from the victims killed, seven others were injured.
Aj’anaye Hill's mother, Chanell White, previously said she thinks the shooting was random and her daughter was in the wrong place at the wrong time.
11Alive also spoke with the family of Samuel Moon, who described him as the "life of their home."
“It feels like someone just took my heart and ripped it out,” Samuel's mother Beverly LaFleur said.
Capt. Jon Mauney in the sheriff's office said the homeowners began to shut the party down as it grew out of control, and that after it was stopped, the shooting occurred about 50 yards away in the street of the cul-de-sac.
Neighbors told 11Alive it was a chaotic scene with the wounded scattering into other yards. A neighboring house was struck by the gunfire.
"Kids were fighting apparently and someone pulled a gun out and she was running and got hit," White said.
The owner of the home said it was a Sweet 16 party for their daughter and that six adults were home for the party. They told 11Alive that they ended the party at 10 p.m. because kids were smoking weed. They claimed that the shooting happened at the top of the cul-de-sac.
"It is absolutely devastating that we are having this conversation again," said Douglas District Attorney Dalia Racine in a press conference last week. "This is an all-out assault on our young people, on our children, on our babies, on our community."
DA Racine pleaded with the public to help provide information, saying, "we have to figure out a solution."
"I am saying this also as a parent of children the same age as those precious babies that we had to see dead lying in the street," she said.