FAYETTE COUNTY, Ga. — A Fayetteville woman accused of fatally shooting a man who left the scene of a hit-and-run crash has been granted bond for a second time after she was indicted on new charges in June, authorities said.
Hannah Renea Payne, 22, was granted a $320,000 bond Friday.
She had previously been granted bond after being arrested on a murder charge in the May shooting death of 62-year-old Kenneth Herring. However, she was indicted on new charges in June, leading to her bond being revoked and her being re-arrested.
On May 7, Payne decided to follow Herring's pickup truck after she saw it hit another vehicle near Clark Howell Highway and Ga. 85, Clayton County police said at the time. Payne called 911 before following the truck about a mile to the intersection of Riverdale Road and Forest Parkway.
She then blocked the driver, who prosecutors said may have been having a medical episode, with her Jeep and got out of her vehicle to confront him with her gun in hand, police said. At some point, Payne allegedly shot Herring in the abdomen, killing him.
Prosecutors said Payne ignored the instructions of 911 dispatchers who told her to stay at the scene of the initial hit-and-run and not to engage the other driver.
"In the background, you can hear (Payne say), ‘Get out of the car. Get out of the car,'" Clayton police Detective Keon Hayward previously said in court.
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After the shooting, a witness recorded a video that appears to show Payne changing her clothes before police arrived.
However, Matt Tucker, Payne's attorney, argued that his client was provoked to further action when Herring's truck hit her Jeep, but police said the two vehicles did not collide at any point during the incident.
Tucker also said his client claims self-defense in the shooting, saying Herring bruised her and ripped her shirt.
"It just seems like an unfortunate situation of a good Samaritan trying to stop a person on a hit-and-run," he previously said.
Clayton County District Attorney Tracy Graham Lawson called Payne the aggressor, describing her as someone who thought she was a police officer during the incident.
"(Payne saying), ‘Get out of the car. Get out of the car,' sounded like a cops show on TV," Lawson said.
After her initial arrest on a murder charge, Payne was granted a $100,000 bond May 31 by judge William H. West. In June, a grand jury indicted her on additional charges of felony murder, malice murder, aggravated assault, false imprisonment and possession of a firearm during a felony, which led to her being rebooked into the Clayton County Jail without bond.
On Friday, Tucker argued that Payne isn't a flight risk. He added that the 911 call that was played in court was incomplete, saying a witness' cellphone video filled in a crucial gap in the tape.
"The audio that was shown to you before just had her screaming, ‘Get out of the car. Get out of the car,'" he said. "It did not have the portion of her screaming, ‘Stop. Stop. Stop.'"
She and her parents were seen crying in court after the judge granted her bond for a second time. As of Friday afternoon, she had not bonded out of jail.
Cox Media Group
