Ginger Leanne Blackmon, a 36-year-old White woman, was a nurse and a mother of three from Rockmart, Georgia, remembered by friends as friendly, loving, and compassionate. Her life came to a violent end on the evening of Sunday, October 18, 2020, at her home on Rice Road. Authorities were dispatched to the residence for a shooting and found Ginger with gunshot wounds. Despite attempts at lifesaving measures, she died at the scene.
Investigators quickly identified her estranged husband, 50-year-old Jimmy Brian Blackmon, as the suspect. According to the prosecution at his trial, Jimmy was angry that Ginger no longer wanted to be with him. He went to her home, shot her five times, and fled. A young child who was in Ginger's co-custody was present in the house at the time. The child did not witness the shooting but heard it and was there when Jimmy Blackmon left the home.
Jimmy’s flight from the scene triggered an eight-day, multi-county manhunt.
A few hours after the shooting, his black GMC pickup truck was found abandoned in the parking lot of a Walmart in East Rome. Police determined that his son from a previous marriage, 21-year-old Corey Brian Blackmon, had picked him up from that location. Corey initially lied to investigators about his father's whereabouts but later admitted to dropping him off on Georgia 101 and Pleasant Valley Road in Floyd County. For misleading police, Corey was arrested and charged with obstruction of law enforcement officers.
The search for Jimmy Blackmon, involving local police and the U.S. Marshals Service, intensified. At one point, he was nearly apprehended near the Rice Road home before he disappeared into the woods. The manhunt finally concluded when authorities located and arrested him at a relative’s property in Carroll County. He was subsequently charged with Ginger’s murder.
In June 2024, the case went to trial in Polk County. The District Attorney argued that Jimmy Blackmon acted not in the heat of the moment, but because he could not handle the fact that his wife wanted to end their relationship. After a three-day trial, a jury found Jimmy Brian Blackmon guilty of malice murder, felony murder, aggravated assault, possession of a firearm during the commission of a crime, and third-degree cruelty to children. As of June 2024, a sentencing hearing was to be scheduled in the following weeks.
