Kent Carter died in what police called a “targeted attack” on Sunday evening.
A Virginia NAACP official, who spent his last moments shielding his girlfriend from gunfire, was fatally shot while vacationing in the Turks and Caicos.
Kent Carter was a Virginia realtor and father of one who served as 1st Vice President of the NAACP Arlington Branch. He was celebrating his birthday on the islands when he died Sunday evening in what police called a “targeted attack,” PEOPLE reports.
The deadly shooting occurred when Carter and his girlfriend Alonia Williams were traveling back to their hotel from a beach. According to police, the couple was riding with a group of people in a shuttle van that armed gunmen in another vehicle ambushed. One other person, who was not identified, was also killed in the attack.
Turks and Caicos police commissioner Trevor Botting said in a statement that the “gang members” pulled up on the group and on the van. Police believe the attack — “one of a series of events” — led to the death of a total of three people and five people sustaining injuries.
“I believe the original attack was targeted and carried out by gang members who acted without conscious, who had no regard for life, and who are hellbent on causing indiscriminate harm and misery across the [Turks and Caicos Islands],” Botting said in a press briefing, PEOPLE reports. “This violence we know is linked to drug supply and is fueled by revenge, turf wars, and retribution.”
Williams, who survived the attack, told Arlington NAACP President Julius D. “JD” Spain, Sr. that Carter used his body as a shield to protect her.
The former special agent and a veteran was not mentioned by name in Botting’s first or second press briefing on the department’s Facebook page, however, the NAACP confirmed that it was Carter who was killed in the attack.
“NAACP Arlington Branch mourns the tragic and unexpected loss of our 1st Vice President, Kent Carter, who passed away Sunday, October 2, 2022, while vacationing abroad,” the organization said in a statement that PEOPLE obtained.
“Our deepest sympathies go out to his family. May God grant them strength during this time of sorrow.”
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