A Conyers teen is back behind bars after he allegedly tied up his mother, attempted to break into a gun safe and led deputies on a manhunt Friday afternoon.
Shortly before 2 p.m., dispatchers received a call from a Squire Lane residence saying the caller needed police and for police to kick the door down, according to Rockdale Sheriff's Office reports. The caller said she was tied up and her son, Joseph, was trying to get into the gun safe.
When deputies arrived, they parked up the street to avoid detection. As they approached at an angle, they could hear the sounds of banging.
As they came closer, they saw three people running out from the back of the house - a white male, a black female and a black male.
Two deputies pursued the suspects on foot. Another deputy went into the house.
"I went to the front door and identified myself as Sheriff's Office and I heard a female's voice from the back of the house," wrote the deputy. "I called to the female again but did not receive any other answers from her. I was unsure if anybody else was in the house so I waited for another officer to arrive to help clear the house."
As another deputy arrived, they went into the house, making sure each room was clear. In the dining room, they saw a large gun safe on its back.
"It appeared it had been beaten with hammers and there was a crowbar that was wedged between the door and the frame of the gun safe." There was also an air compressor in the kitchen with a line attached to an air drill lying next to the safe. There were also safety glasses and ear protection muffs on the dining room table.
When they opened the door the bedroom, they saw the 39-year-old female victim with her hands and feet tied. The deputies cut the rope.
Outside, deputies set up a search perimeter with K-9 units to track the three suspects. Honey Creek Elementary School was put on a preventative lockdown for about an hour, delaying students' release from school.
The first suspect was caught around 2:30 p.m. Quenton Lee Harris, 18, the black male suspect, was found near Goode Road and Stanton Road behind a house.
A 14-year-old black female suspect was spotted around 3 p.m. near Goode Road and Stanton Road and taken into custody.
The white male suspect, Joseph Tod Coddington, Jr., the 17-year-old son of the victim, was caught around 5 p.m. in the same area and taken into custody.
A neighbor later told deputies they saw Joseph Coddington with two other people on the front porch around 10:50 a.m. that morning. Coddington reportedly removed the storm window and pried open the window to enter the house. He then opened the door for the other two people.
The 39-year-old victim said her son had called her shortly after 11 a.m. asking when she would be home. She came home around 1:30 p.m.
"When she entered into the front door her son Joseph was standing there and told her 'We can do this the hard way or the easy way' and then grabbed her," wrote the reporting deputy. She struggled to get away through the front door, in but her son dragged her by the hair back to the bedroom. The victim's shoes left marks in the foyer from the struggle.
Coddington then reportedly tied up his mother and told her "she had better not call the police because he was not going back to jail" and that if she did call the police, he would kill her.
Coddington was arrested in November 2014 on charges of child molestation and possession of marijuana less than one ounce.
All three suspects currently face charges of burglary, kidnapping, false imprisonment, criminal damage to property in the first degree, willful obstruction of law enforcement officers misdemeanor.
Coddington and Harris were booked into the Rockdale County jail. The 14-year-old was booked into the Rockdale Youth Detention Center.