A volunteer firefighter has been arrested and charged with obstruction after he was accused of taking pictures of the twin brothers who were found dead on a Georgia mountaintop from gunshot wounds.
Reports state that Scott Kerlin, 42, is facing a misdemeanor charge of obstruction after he was accused of taking pictures of the 19-year-old twin brothers Qaadir and Naazir Lewis and shared them publicly.
We reported that the Lewis brothers were found on top of Bell Mountain in Hiawassee, Georgia on the morning of March 8, about 90 miles away from their home. The teens were found by hikers and their death was originally ruled as a murder-suicide.
However, the Lewis family does not believe that the brothers wouldn’t commit an act like that because they were inseparable and never got into a fistfight. The family also said that the boys were not familiar with the mountain.
“How did they end up out in the mountain? They don’t hike out there; they’ve never been out there,” Samira Brawner, the twins’ aunt, told reporters. “They don’t know anything about Hiawassee, Georgia. They never even heard of Bell Mountain, so how did they end up right there?”
It’s unclear how Kerlin shared pictures of the scene. Darren Berrong, Towns County Schools Superintendent said that the photos were being shared among students. In a statement, he said that the school district was “made aware that a crime scene photo had been shared with some of our students on Monday.”
He added, “The district launched an investigation and took appropriate measures to ensure the photo was no longer in the possession of any student.” Berrong continued, “The students involved were unaware of the illegal nature of how the photo was distributed.”
Brawner said that she doesn’t like to go online because she’s scared of seeing the photos of her nephews. “It’s scary. I’m literally scared to go on social media. I’m scared to pick up my phone because I know if I see that picture, I already know I’ll have a heart attack.”
The Georgia Bureau of Investigation is helping the Towns County Sheriff’s office in the death investigation.