Robbery Getaway Driver Charged With Murder After Gas Station Clerk Killed Over $96, Cops Say

A man and a teenager are in custody in connection to the fatal shooting of a gas station clerk during a robbery in North Carolina, authorities announced this week.

On July 12, police in South Carolina announced the arrest of a 17-year-old juvenile male for the shooting, WFMY reported.

Two days earlier, law enforcement officers in Star took James William Ward, Jr., 57, into custody in connection to the death of 53-year-old Laura Lynn Whiteman, according to WGHP.

On June 25, Whitman was working for the first time at Quick Chek after she was recently transferred from another location in a nearby town.

Courtney Rodriguez said a work colleague broke the news her mother was shot during her shift at the new location.

“My manager calls me and she’s like ‘Are you okay?’ And I’m like, ‘What are you talking about?'” Rodriguez told WGHP.

According to Rodriguez, the manager said Whitman was behind the cash register when a man allegedly robbing her shortly after 10 p.m. jumped the counter, fatally shot her, grabbed $96 and fled the scene.

Police said they believe Ward was the getaway driver the evening of the incident.

Ward was being held in the Forsyth County Jail without bond on charges of first-degree murder and robbery with a deadly weapon, WFMY reported.

“I don’t want him out, he doesn’t deserve to be out, he doesn’t deserve to be free,” Rodriguez said, recalling her “sweet” mother was “the kind of person that would give you the shirt off her back” and that “everybody loved her.”