On April 14, 1978, Chief Deputy Sheriff Baxter Glenn Shavers, 24, was killed while on duty in Fort Oglethorpe, Georgia. Deputies Baxter Shavers and Investigator George Brown stopped a vehicle matching the getaway car at 625 Battlefield Parkway. During a frisk the suspect disarmed Shavers, shot Investigator Brown in the groin, then fired at Shavers, striking him in the neck and killing him instantly. The gunman fired additional shots at the fallen deputy before fleeing; Brown, though seriously injured, returned fire as the suspect fled.

Authorities apprehended Robert Lewis Collier the next day on Interstate 24 in Marion County, Tennessee. Collier was tried and convicted for Shavers’s murder, the aggravated assault of Investigator Brown, and three counts of armed robbery; the jury originally imposed the death penalty, later commuted to life in prison. Shavers had served five years with the agency and was survived by his wife and two children.