‘My friend got shot’: Witness tells 911 after Hilton Head teen killed in Bluffton
Newly released audio of the 911 call made moments after 18-year-old Trey Blackshear of Hilton Head Island was fatally shot in a Bluffton church parking lot on Dec. 23 details minutes of panic and confusion before emergency workers arrived.
Blackshear’s friend, who was sitting with him in his car when the shooting occurred, called 911 at 2:20 p.m., according to documents obtained by The Island Packet and Beaufort Gazette.
“911, what is your emergency?”
“My... my friend got shot,” the caller said. “I think he’s dead.”
He told the dispatcher he and Blackshear were at the Lutheran church across from the McDonald’s on Buckwalter in Bluffton.
“My friend picked me up,” he said. “I was in the car with him. There were some dudes that got in the car, and they shot, and I was laying there, and I thought I was dead too, but I....”
The first two minutes of the call consist of the dispatcher and the caller going back and forth on the exact location.
“Can you please hurry up?” the caller pleads.
He says the two suspects, both carrying two guns, ran across the street to the McDonald’s.
“What kind of guns?” the dispatcher asks. “Were they handguns? Pistols?”
The caller says he doesn’t know.
“They pulled (the guns) out, my friend tried to grab it and then they just started going crazy, and I just laid there, then I got up and ran,” he said.
For eight seconds, no one says anything. The only sound is the clicking of the keyboard as the dispatcher types.
Then the caller begins crying.
“Oh my ... God, dude,” he says. “My ... best friend.”
A few seconds are redacted from the audio, and then the caller identifies his friend as Trey Blackshear.
The caller continues to describe what happened when he sees an ambulance pass the church.
“Oh my God, the ambulance just turned,” he shouts. “They’re going the wrong way. Oh my God.... The ambulance went the wrong way. I’m across the street.”
“I’m letting them know now,” the dispatcher assured him.
Almost 40 seconds pass before the dispatcher says, “Law enforcement can’t find you. I need to know your exact location.”
“I’m literally across the street from where they just turned,” the caller said. “The police are turning. I’m over here. Oh my God. They’re all going to Buckwalter, but I’m across the street from the Exxon.”
Almost an entire minute passes, then the caller says, “I think they’re here.”
“They’re here,” he says six minutes and three seconds into the phone call before hanging up.
After the 911 call, 10 officers arrived, along with about a dozen of Blackshear’s friends and family.
Police discovered Blackshear was shot multiple times while sitting in the driver’s seat of his car parked in the Lord of Life Lutheran Church along Buckwalter Parkway.
During the 911 call and after further investigation, police learned two suspects ran from the scene to a nearby gas station and then a bank, where they got into a light-colored sedan and drove away, according to previous reporting.
On Friday, four days after the shooting, investigators found the suspects’ car at a home on Mink Point Boulevard in the Beaufort area. When police searched the home and vehicles on the property, they found several handguns, rifles and drugs. No arrests were made at the time, the Beaufort County Sheriff’s news release said, but “criminal charges are expected.”
A 16-year-old male turned himself into the Sheriff’s Office in Beaufort the next morning and was charged in Blackshear’s death. Bluffton Police then transported him to the Department of Juvenile Justice detention facility in Columbia.
The investigation is ongoing.
This story was originally published January 3, 2020 at 4:30 AM.
