By Austin Rust-
At 7:29 a.m. on Friday, Sept. 27, Adams County Sheriff Kimmy Rogers received a report of a robbery at the Seaman Marathon gas station near the intersection of State Routes 32 and 247.
“In the call, it was reported as a robbery with a deceased victim,” said Sheriff Rogers, answering questions from local television news reporters. “When I heard that part, I just said, ‘Where’s it at?’ and I responded to the scene. I didn’t ask a bunch of questions until I got over there.”
A 29-year-old clerk at the Seaman Marathon station, Kasey DePriest, was injured in the incident, and a 49-year old delivery man from Grayson, Ky., Andrew Louis Kunst, was found dead on the scene, both injured by the shooter, 44-year old Brandon Carter of Seamasn.
DePriest, an Adams County resident, was transported to a hospital in Cincinnati by aircare and has undergone multiple surgeries. After she had been admitted, Sheriff Rogers spoke with her father, who – at the time of conversation – relayed that she was “doing pretty good”.
According to eyewitnesses Ernie Butts and Eddie Geeslin, who are both regulars at the Seaman Marathon gas station for morning coffee, the shooter – now identified as Brandon Carter, age 44 of Seaman – attempted to take DePriest away from the station in his vehicle.
“As me and Eddie (Geeslin) was leaving the Marathon that morning, a guy came running from out back and said, ‘Somebody call 911 – someone’s been shot,’” said Ernie Butts, referring to a man who had been riding along with Andrew Kunst, the delivery driver, for training that morning. “I reached for my phone, dialing, and we were walking out the door,” Butts continued.
“When I stepped out the front door, I heard somebody screaming, and I looked to the right of me,” said Geeslin. “Well, it’d be the north side of the parking lot – that’s where he was parked at, his pick-up truck – and he had Kasey in the pick-up truck on the passenger’s side. She was screaming and fighting with him, from what I could see. She broke loose from him, and ran – she probably ran 10, 12, maybe 15 feet. He had a handgun in his right hand, I heard a crack, and about that time she fell. He shot her in the back. I think he shot her low enough where he hit one lung – now whether that’s right or not, I don’t know.”
“I started to go to the driver’s side (of my vehicle), because I was parked right at the front door there, and I didn’t know if he was going to start shooting at me next or not,” Geeslin continued. “I didn’t know, so I went around, got in the passenger side of my truck, and backed up. By that time he’d took off, going south. He got over at the red light, and I saw his truck sitting over there, but I didn’t see which way he went at that time. I didn’t know which way he went.”
“I looked over at the parking lot, and the girl – she was laying in the parking lot, so I went over to her,” said Butts. “She was saying, ‘Help me! Help me!’ Well, I told her I got 911 on the phone, and they’re sending the life squad. Debbie, that’s who manages the Marathon, she stopped with her granddaughter, and she said, ‘Who is it?”’I said, “’t’s Kasey,’ and ‘Oh my God!’ she said. She kind of went into hysterics, and then she kind of calmed herself. Somebody handed her a cell phone, and she said, “We’ve got to call her Dad and Mom.”
“Kasey told her her number, but she couldn’t get nobody to answer the phone, so I told Debbie, “I know where she lives. I’ll go tell them,” Butts continued. “So I jumped in my truck. The life squad was there, they were getting ready to put her on a cot. I went to Kasey’s house and I told her Dad (what had happened). He said, “I’ll be right over” – he was walking the dog outside.”
“When I got back to the Marathon, Kasey was gone, and I never did see her Dad come in,” said Butts. “Evidently, he’d gone straight to the hospital. They flew in a helicopter in and took her.”
“She’d worked there off and on for a long time – well, I’d say maybe five or six years, maybe longer,” Geeslin added. “She just worked mostly on Friday. She worked every Friday, and then she worked on weekends is what she did, because she’s went to Shawnee College a good bit.”
“I never seen the delivery guy get shot on the outside,” Geeslin continued. “Me and Ernie was sitting there, and we never even heard a gun or nothing. When we got over to the girl, Kasey, that got shot, they said that there was a victim behind the building over there, where he’d come in the side door – the delivery guy. They were over there, but they came back, the two life squad members, and they said, ‘There’s no point going over there. He’s already dead.’ So (Carter, the shooter) must have killed him instantly, I guess. I don’t know what happened there.”
According to Sheriff Rogers, the delivery driver, Andrew Kunst, was in the delivery truck unloading some product when the shooter, Brandon Carter, was taking Kasey DePriest out of the gas station’s back door towards his pickup truck, and that’s when Carter shot Kunst. The person that Kunst was training on the delivery route was inside of the gas station when this occurred.
After leaving the Seaman Marathon gas station, Carter crossed State Route 32 to rob the Seaman 1st Stop gas station, leaving with approximately $372. No shots were fired at this location.
At 7:47 a.m., a trooper from the Georgetown Post of the Ohio State Highway Patrol (OHSP) and an Adams County Sheriff’s Deputy attempted to stop a 1999 green Dodge Dakota on State Route 73 near Portsmouth Road in Adams County, according to OHSP Lieutenant Craig Cvetan. They were told that this was the vehicle involved in the gas station shooting and other incidents in the village of Seaman. Carter did not stop, and a chase ensued, said Cvetan. It continued nearly 50 miles east on State Route 32 into Pike County, where stop sticks were deployed.
The chase ended at 8:09 a.m. on State Route 32 when the suspect’s vehicle swerved hard to the left across the median into the westbound lanes. The suspect shot himself while driving, said Lt. Cvetan, which caused his car to crash. Carter apparently died from this self-inflicted gunshot wound.
The incident is currently under investigation by the Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigations. Officials are currently working four separate scenes in connection with the fatal shooting: the Seaman Marathon gas station, the Seaman First Stop gas station, the section of State Route 32 where the suspect crashed and died, and the suspect’s home, which caught fire the same morning. It is not yet clear how the fire connects to the rest of the investigations, but according to Sheriff Rogers, the current belief is that the fire was set intentionally. Carter allegedly lived at the home with his mother, and female human remains were found in the home. A cause of death has not yet been determined by the coroner, and these remains have not yet been identified.
