Ray Clifford Buddy Beasley Jr., 36, was shot and killed at the intersection of Rock Ford and Mixon roads in Bulloch County, Georgia, on the night of October 27, 2020. Deputies found Beasley deceased from a gunshot wound; he was unarmed at the time. A 35-year-old man, Dustin Leigh Cowart, was at the scene and taken into custody without incident.

Investigators say the two men had arranged to meet to discuss Beasley’s relationship with Cowart’s ex-wife, and the discussion escalated into the shooting. Cowart, a former deputy with the Bulloch County Sheriff’s Office, was charged with felony murder, aggravated assault, and possession of a firearm during the commission of a crime and held in the county jail without bond pending court proceedings. What details about the meeting or the lead-up to that night might help explain how it turned deadly?