HARDY COUNTY, W.Va. — A Hardy County teacher was found dead and her boyfriend was in critical condition at a Virginia hospital after shooting himself.
Police were sent to the home of Joy Coby, 45, when she did not report to work at Moorefield Middle School on Wednesday morning.
Officers found that Coby had not returned home throughout the night and her boyfriend, identified as Jared Conners, had been to the home at some point.
Conners was stopped Wednesday afternoon while driving Coby’s car at a Wal-Mart in Staunton, Va. According to investigators, he shot himself in front of a Virginia state police trooper.
Conners was being treated at the University of Virginia Medical Center.
Less than two hours after Conners’ suicide attempt, his girlfriend’s body was located in a wooded area near her home. Moorefield police said Coby had been shot multiple times.
She was listed as a seventh-grade reading teacher in the Moorefield Middle School directory.
On Facebook, community members and former students posted tributes to Cody.
“Joy was a blessing in my life growing up, I didn’t know her to have a mean bone in her body,” wrote one.
Another commented: “Joy Coby was an amazing woman and in no way deserved this. I will not sleep well tonight as I lay down with an extremely heavy and broken heart.”
One former student wrote Coby was “one of the reasons I am in college to be a future social studies teacher. Teachers touch millions, and I am very fortunate to have been one of her students. … R.I.P. Mrs. Coby. You will be on my thoughts when I am teaching a class of my own.”