An Augusta man was fatally shot by U.S. Deputy Marshals on Thursday morning after a high-speed chase in Aiken ended in a violent wreck, authorities said.
Robert L. Wright, 34, was being sought Thursday morning by the federal marshals, who had an arrest warrant for him. They tracked him to a hotel on Whiskey Road in Aiken, Coroner Darryl Ables said in a press release.
“Mr. Wright fled from officers leading them on a high-speed chase that ended with the vehicles crashing into one another on Charleston Highway,” the coroner said. “Multiple shots were fired by the deputy marshals striking Mr. Wright several times. Mr. Wright was pronounced dead on the scene.”
Agents from the South Carolina Law Enforcement Division are investigating the shooting incident. A SLED press release said the officers who fired guns at Wright were an ATF agent and a task force officer assigned to the U.S. Marshals Service Task Force.
Wright has a substantial arrest record from Richmond County. Last September, he was jailed for trafficking cocaine and later released, according to arrest records. He is the same man who spent time in prison for drug charges and an aggravated assault.
Wright also beat a murder charge from 2011, when he was initially connected to a fatal shooting of Ashley Dandrea Brown which occurred at Club 5150 on Deans Bridge Road in September 2011. Two others were also charged. Murder and weapons charges against Wright were dropped in 2015.
