Timothy M. Wallace, who graduated

with Reed from McIntosh High School in 1999 but only "knew of him"

in school got to know him better two summers ago when they both spent

some time in the Fayette County Jail. Wallace was locked up for violating

probation with a failed drug test for marijuana and Reed for auto theft.

Wallace said the Reed he knew

at the jail was peaceful and quiet.

"It wasn't like he

was truly a deviant," Wallace said, adding that he doesn't sympathize

with Reed for attacking the clerk. Wallace also admitted that Reed had

become a "career criminal" by stealing cars.

Police said Reed tied the victim

up, raped her and set her back afire. Reed died Friday afternoon fleeing

a Coweta County Sheriff's deputy in a car he stole from his roommate

in Sharpsburg.

"When I first found out

about it," Wallace said of the attack, "I thought somebody needs

to rape him." Wallace said knowing the suspect drove a fast car made

him feel like he just might have known the then-unnamed suspect at one

time.

It wasn't until Friday

when Wallace found out Reed was accused of the crime.

"It really messed me up,"

Wallace said.

Wallace said he and Reed got

along well in jail and played board games, discussed going to bars in

Atlanta and other life experiences. Reed told him he was able to steal

cars partly based on his knowledge of electronics; Reed took an electronics

class at McIntosh, Wallace noted.

Reed never lost his cool in

the jail, Wallace said.

"There are some people

I know who it wouldn't be a huge shock if they did it," Wallace

said of the hotel attack. "Obviously it was very twisted but he never

gave that kind of impression."

In a letter to the editor of

The Citizen (see Page A4), Wallace said he spent his time in jail "thinking

of straightening my life out; I suppose now that he planned to remain

on his present track."

"Beau Reed, no matter

who he was or who I remember him to be, became one of life's truly

evil men," Wallace wrote. "He became a vessel of hate, spreading

pain and torment in our world. He deserved far worse than death for his

sins, and only God can justly punish his soul."

In the letter, Wallace wondered

what sent Reed on his path to the violent attack, which left the hotel

clerk with second and third degree burns and both physical and mental

scars.

"It is obvious Beau chose

to be a criminal for a living. Maybe he became a drug addict as well,"

Wallace wrote. "He spent time in state prison, so maybe something

happened to him there. Of course, these speculations are simple answers

to a very hard question: Why? Why would anyone torment an innocent life

with such selfish acts of violence?"

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