Beloved Clayton County teacher killed during trip to grocery store

ROCKDALE COUNTY, Ga. — A beloved teacher went into a local supermarket with her grandkids, then remembered she left her debit card in the car. She went to get it and never made it back inside. A driver hit and killed her.

Channel 2′s Tom Jones spoke to the husband of 72-year-old Janice Knox.

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“The strength of God is literally holding me up at this moment,” husband Aaron Knox told Jones.

He needs to be held up after losing the longtime love of his life in a traffic incident.

“I’m gonna miss my baby. I’m just gonna be honest with you guys,” he said.

He and the Clayton County teacher had been married for 52 years. They dated for five years before that, beginning in high school.

“She was everything. I’m being honest. She was everything,” he said.

Then Sunday afternoon, the grandmother went to the Publix supermarket on Highway 212 in Rockdale County with her grandkids.

They all walked into the store. Then, Knox remembered she left her debit card in the car. She ran out to get it while the grandkids stayed inside.

“As she came back to the store, I think, it was some young guy that was not paying attention. He hit my wife,” Knox explained.

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His wife died later at the hospital.

“He had to be not paying attention or speeding coming across there,” Knox said.

Now, Knox is holding on to the memories built over nearly six decades together.

“I love this girl,” her husband said.

He remembers how his wife went from working in real estate to getting her teaching degree and loving being in the classroom. He also remembers the last words he spoke to her.

“My last words to my wife were, “Did you know you (left) the front door open?” “I say yeah baby. I burned the pizza up and I’m airing the house out.”

Fortunately, the grandkids did not see what happened.

The Rockdale County Sheriff’s Office said the driver of the vehicle has been identified as a 17-year-old boy.

No arrests have been made at this time.

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