On Tuesday, the Georgia Bureau of Investigation and Moultrie Police Department arrested a Moultrie, GA man for the murder of his girlfriend in 2016.
In 2016, Shada Esther was reported missing by family when she didn't pick up her three children at the school bus stop on August 23. Two days later, Moultrie police requested GBI assistance into the missing person's investigation.
Police determined that her then-boyfriend Michael Head was her last contact before her disappearance. Within an hour of Esther's last known contact with anyone else, Head left Moultrie and traveled to Atlanta roughly three hours away.
Heads was then interviewed by the GBI Region 10 office and Gwinnett County police, but was not arrested at the time. Sometime afterward, he moved to Slidell, Louisiana.
In February 2017, the Banks County Sheriff's Office requested the GBI Region 11 office in Athens to process a scene where human remains had been found. In April 2019, those remains were confirmed with DNA testing to be those of Shada Esther.
The GBI and MPD secured arrest warrants and traveled to Slidell, and arrested Heads with "crucial assistance" from St. Tammany Parrish's Sherrif Office. The extradition process will begin in Louisiana to return Heads to Georgia to face criminal charges, according to a GBI press release.
The investigation is still active and ongoing. Police encourage anyone with information to contact the Moultrie Police Department at (229) 985-3131 or the GBI Thomasville Office at (229) 225-4090.