‘My heart was beating like crazy’: Sitter calls 911 after Hilton Head gunfire
On Saturday afternoon, Lark Street was quiet. Birds — perhaps larks — could be heard singing from the trees in the Hilton Head neighborhood.
Curious neighbors passed through on bicycles, peering at the empty vacation home where a deadly shooting had occurred just two days prior.
Nothing about the property indicated that it had been the scene of a horrific crime. The driveway where the bodies of victims had been found had been cleaned of any blood splatters, and no police tape marked off the area.
At around 11:30 p.m. Thursday, neighbors say they heard about six gunshots ring out, followed by a woman screaming and then more gunshots.
Deputies arrived to find two people lying dead outside a rental home at 4 Lark Street, in the North Forest Beach neighborhood. The Beaufort County Coroner’s Office later identified the victims as David Duffey, 62, of Hilton Head Island and Catherine Warrington, 50, of Bluffton.
The suspected gunman fled before police arrived, but deputies used automatic license plate reading cameras to track him down at his home at 36 Promenade Street.
After several hours of negotiation, the suspect died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound at approximately 4:40 a.m. The coroner’s office later identified him as Dustin Linsley, 52.
A 56-year-old female, who was inside the home with Linsley, exited the house unharmed, according to the BSCO alert.
Babysitter calls 911
Lark Street is normally a “very quiet” neighborhood, Serrana Moreno said.
The 47-year old Hardeeville resident has been babysitting for a family on that street for 10 years.
Many of the homes on Lark Street are vacation rentals, but Moreno’s clients live there full-time.
“You never see nothing disturbing or anything,” Moreno said.
On Thursday evening, Moreno was lying down in the downstairs bedroom of the home, ready to fall asleep.
At about 11:30 p.m., she heard six gunshots, followed by a woman “screaming.”
“It was very scary,” Moreno said. “My heart went like crazy.”
The first thing she did was called the girl she looks after, who was in her bedroom upstairs, to ask if she was OK.
After confirming that the child was unharmed, Moreno told her to stay in her room while she ran upstairs.
“I said, ‘Don’t unlock the door until I get there,’” Moreno recounted.
Moreno called 911 after running to the child’s room and making sure she was safe. Dispatchers told her she had not been the first person to report the gunshots.
Police arrived on the scene shortly after, but Moreno stayed with the child in her room. Police cars remained at the scene “all night,” she said.
Curious neighbors visit crime scene
Trisha Firth, a resident of North Forest Beach, was cycling through Lark Street Saturday afternoon to check out the home.
At the time of the shooting, Firth said she was at home watching the Olympics on TV. She didn’t hear the gunshots, but at about 11:30 p.m., she overhead a car “flying down” North Forest Beach Drive. She presumes that was the suspect fleeing the scene.
Not everyone in the neighborhood got the news of the murder-suicide on the street, though.
Jesse Davis, who is visiting from Baltimore, just arrived at his short-term rental on Lark Street last night. He had no idea about the recent shooting.
“We didn’t see anything,” Davis said. “That’s crazy.”
