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Michael David Ludwick is 20 and lives in Madison. Friday night around 11 p.m. officers locked him up on a murder charge. His father Joshua, 38, got the same charge at the same time. Both arrests happened in Madison with help from Morgan and Walton county crews.

Hours earlier deputies in Putnam County answered a call about a body in Rooty Creek. The Flatrock community near Highway 441 is where they found Zachary Smith face down in the water. The 19-year-old from Eatonton had multiple gunshot wounds to the chest. Casings were right there at the scene.

Investigators say Michael is the shooter. They say Joshua stood by and then drove his son away afterward. That is why both men face the murder count. Sheriff Howard Sills confirmed the details once the arrests were done.

No motive has been given out. The creek sits quiet most days. On this Friday it became the place where a young man from Eatonton lost his life and two men from Madison ended up in handcuffs.

Zachary was only 19. The people who knew him are dealing with the fact that a regular afternoon turned into this. The shell casings and the drive away from the scene are the pieces the sheriff’s office is working with right now.

Madison is not far from Putnam County. The trip from Rooty Creek to the arrest location did not take long. By 11 p.m. both father and son were in custody. The investigation keeps going while the charges move through the system.

Two different towns now share the same story. Eatonton lost Zachary. Madison saw the arrests. Rooty Creek is the spot that ties them together. That is where the body was found and where the casings were left behind

Zachary Smith was 19 years old and lived in Eatonton. Deputies found him face down in Rooty Creek late Friday afternoon. The spot sits in the Flatrock area of Putnam County near U.S. Highway 441. Someone called in the tip around 6 p.m. after spotting what looked like a body in the water.

Sheriff Howard Sills said his team got there quick. Zachary had several gunshot wounds in his chest. Shell casings lay nearby on the ground. The scene pointed straight to a shooting right there by the creek.

Michael David Ludwick, age 20 from Madison, is the one charged with pulling the trigger. His dad Joshua David Ludwick, 38, faces the same murder charge. Investigators say the father was there when it happened and then drove his son away from the creek.

Both men got picked up in Madison around 11 that night. Officers from Morgan and Walton counties helped make the arrests. No one has said what set the whole thing off. The case stays open while more work gets done.

Zachary grew up around Eatonton. Friends and family knew him as a regular 19-year-old with plans still ahead. Now those plans stop at Rooty Creek. The people closest to him are left sorting through the sudden hole he left.

Putnam County does not see this kind of call every day. A young man found shot in a creek draws attention fast. The shell casings and the two arrests give the investigation a clear starting point. Still, the full story of that Friday afternoon has not come out yet.

The charges against Michael and Joshua remain just charges for now. They will have their day in court. Meanwhile Zachary’s name is the one people in Eatonton and Madison keep repeating when they talk about what happened down by the water.

A green Ford Escape ran the wrong way down Highway 17 late Friday. It was about 11:45 p.m. near Old Highway 17 in Franklin County. The driver headed south in the northbound lanes.

Isaac McCraw drove a red Mazda 3 the other way. He was 19 and from Demorest. His car stayed in the left northbound lane. The Ford hit him straight on.

Flames broke out on the Ford Escape after the impact. Both drivers died right there on the road. Georgia State Patrol troopers worked the scene.

McCraw’s passenger, Noel Adrian Hutchings, 18, of Cleveland, lived through it. He suffered serious injuries. An ambulance rushed him to Northeast Georgia Medical Center in Gainesville.

Officials held back the name of the Ford driver. Family members already know. The probe into what happened continues.

This part of Franklin County lies near the state line with South Carolina. Highway 17 runs past places like Hartwell and Lavonia. One wrong-way move ended two lives in a hurry.

The fire and the force of the crash left little hope for the drivers. Hutchings remains the only one who made it to the hospital.

Isaac McCraw was just 19 years old. He lived in Demorest. Late Friday night he drove his red 2021 Mazda 3 north on Highway 17 in Franklin County.

Around 11:45 p.m. a green 2013 Ford Escape came the wrong way. It headed south in the northbound lanes near Old Highway 17. The two cars slammed into each other head-on in the left lane.

The Ford Escape caught fire right after the crash. Troopers from the Georgia State Patrol got there fast. They found McCraw dead at the scene. The driver of the Ford Escape also died there.

McCraw had a passenger with him. Noel Adrian Hutchings was 18 and from Cleveland. He got hurt bad. Crews took him to Northeast Georgia Medical Center in Gainesville for treatment of serious injuries.

The name of the Ford Escape driver stays private for now. Next of kin got the news. The crash investigation is still going on.

Franklin County sits in northeastern Georgia close to the South Carolina line. Towns like Hartwell and Lavonia are nearby. This stretch of Highway 17 saw a quiet night turn deadly in seconds.

McCraw’s family now faces a hard loss. The Mazda never had a chance against the wrong-way vehicle.

The crash unfolded fast on Cemetery Road in Loyalsock Township last Friday. Damion L. Sims, 46, from Williamsport, drove his southbound 2005 Mercury Mountaineer near the 527 address just before 5 p.m. Control slipped away without any storm or wet pavement to blame.

His SUV crossed the center line into the opposite lane. It then climbed the embankment on the far side. Trees took the first hard hits.

After striking those trees the Mountaineer rolled over several times. It came to rest on its right side facing a different direction from the one Sims started. State police said the roadway stayed dry the whole time.

Sims was pronounced dead right there. No other people rode with him. Investigators found nothing that called for charges against anyone.

Loyalsock Township belongs to Lycoming County up in north-central Pennsylvania. The spot sits close to Williamsport and falls inside the broader metropolitan area. Drivers know Cemetery Road as a regular local route.

The single-vehicle wreck left the SUV damaged from the embankment, the trees, and the rolls. Crews handled the scene while the coroner took charge of the body. Clear weather and dry asphalt ruled out common excuses for the loss of control.

What remains is a quiet stretch of road where one afternoon drive turned into a fatal series of impacts and flips. Police closed their report with those basic details intact.

Damion L. Sims was 46 years old and lived in Williamsport. On Friday afternoon his life ended on a quiet stretch of Cemetery Road in Loyalsock Township. He was alone in his 2005 Mercury Mountaineer when everything changed in seconds.

Shortly before 5 p.m. Sims headed south near 527 Cemetery Road. He lost control of the SUV for reasons still unknown. The vehicle crossed straight into the northbound lane.

From there the Mountaineer climbed an embankment and slammed into several trees. It then rolled over multiple times. When it finally stopped, the SUV lay on its right side.

State police found Sims dead at the scene. No one else was in the vehicle. The road was dry that day. Weather played no part in what happened.

Troopers looked into the crash and filed no charges. Loyalsock Township sits in Lycoming County in north-central Pennsylvania, right near Williamsport. It is part of the Williamsport area where people drive these roads every day.

Sims left behind the simple facts of a sudden wreck on a familiar local road. The Mercury Mountaineer took the brunt of the impacts against trees and the ground. Emergency crews arrived to a scene that needed no further medical help for the driver.

Neighbors and drivers who use Cemetery Road now know the spot near Wildwood Cemetery where one man’s trip home ended without warning. The investigation closed with the same clear conditions reported from the start.

The crash that killed Patrick Duane Liverman started like any other Thursday night call in Pueblo. Officers rolled up to Fortino Boulevard and Elizabeth Street at 8:45 p.m. on October 8 and found three vehicles twisted together.

A Ford Fusion and a GMC truck had people inside who got banged up but lived. The GMC sat in the grass off the east side of Elizabeth. The single man in the Nissan SUV did not make it. Medics called him dead right there.

That man was Patrick Duane Liverman, 58, a Pueblo resident. The county coroner put the name out after next of kin got the news.

This one pushed the city’s fatal crash count to 14 for the year. Traffic cops and the identification unit are still digging into what happened between those three cars.

Liverman’s people now face the days that come after a phone call no one wants. The road stayed closed while crews worked the scene that night.

No one has said yet how the vehicles came together or who was at fault. The investigation is open and that is where it sits.

Pueblo keeps rolling, but for the folks who knew Liverman the intersection will look different for a long time.

Patrick Duane Liverman, 58, of Pueblo, Colorado, died Thursday night in a crash that left his Nissan SUV crushed at the intersection of Fortino Boulevard and Elizabeth Street.

Police got the call around 8:45 p.m. on October 8. They found three vehicles smashed together. A Ford Fusion and a GMC truck sat damaged nearby. The GMC had ended up in the grass east of Elizabeth Street.

The people in the Ford and the GMC walked away with minor injuries. Liverman was the only one in the Nissan. Medics checked him right there on the street and said he was gone.

The Pueblo County Coroner’s Office named him the next day. His family got the word. That is about all anyone knows so far.

Cops from the traffic unit and the identification unit are still working the scene. They have not said who hit who or how the wreck started.

Liverman lived in Pueblo. At 58 he had put in a full run of years here. Now his name sits on the city’s 14th fatal crash list for 2026.

Friends and family are left with the quiet that follows a sudden call like this. The investigation keeps going. No other details have come out.

The booking sheet at Greenville County Detention Center carries the name Randy Lee Smith. Deputies logged him in on Oct. 7. He is 62. Six charges sit against him. They include criminal sexual conduct with a minor third degree tied to a lewd act involving a child 14 to 16. Incest is listed. So is criminal sexual conduct with a minor second degree. Two counts of contributing to the delinquency of a minor round out part of the sheet. Assault with intent to commit criminal sexual conduct third degree completes it.

Bond stays unset on every count according to the latest jail records. The Greenville County Sheriff’s Office handled the arrest. How the investigation started has not been made public.

For 31 years Smith worked as a DEA special agent. The Department of Justice employed him through decades of drug cases. A 2021 profile from FAVOR Upstate confirmed that stretch of service. In April 2021 he took the post of criminal justice coordinator at FAVOR Greenville. The nonprofit focuses on addiction recovery. He is no longer listed among their staff.

The Rotary Club of Greenville recognized him earlier for his work in federal law enforcement. That honor marked a high point in a career built on chasing narcotics. Now the same records that once listed his agency credentials show him as an inmate with no bond.

The charges remain serious and multiple. The sheriff’s office stands as the arresting agency. Nothing further about the underlying facts has been released. Smith’s path from three decades of federal badges to a county jail cell forms the core of the story as it stands today.

The detention center holds him while the case waits for a judge to address bond. His prior roles in recovery work and civic recognition sit beside the new charges in the public record.

Randy Lee Smith sat in the Greenville County Detention Center after deputies booked him on Oct. 7. The 62-year-old faces six charges. One is criminal sexual conduct with a minor in the third degree for a lewd act with a child between 14 and 16 years old. Another is incest. He also faces criminal sexual conduct with a minor in the second degree. Two counts of contributing to the delinquency of a minor appear on the list. So does assault with intent to commit criminal sexual conduct in the third degree.

No judge had set bond on any of those counts when the jail records came out. The Greenville County Sheriff’s Office made the arrest. Details of what led to the charges stay unclear.

Smith spent 31 years as a special agent with the Drug Enforcement Administration. That long stretch put him deep inside federal drug work across the country. In June 2021 a staff write-up from FAVOR Upstate laid out his career. By April of that same year he had stepped into a new role. He became the first criminal justice coordinator for FAVOR Greenville. The group helps people with addiction recovery and support. His name no longer shows up on their staff page.

The Rotary Club of Greenville once honored him for his federal law enforcement service. That recognition came during the years he still wore the badge. Now the same man who chased drug traffickers for more than three decades sits behind bars in the county jail. The shift from agent to inmate happened fast.

Jail records list every charge. They show the booking date. They note the lack of bond. Nothing more about the case has come out yet. The sheriff’s office remains the agency on the paperwork. Smith’s decades of service stand in sharp contrast to the charges now attached to his name.

People who knew him from the Rotary dinners or the recovery work at FAVOR now see a different picture. The man who once stood for federal authority faces the full weight of state charges in his own home county. The case moves forward from the detention center where he remains held.