Fishing Trip ‘Massacre’ Of Three Best Friends Yields ‘Well Over 100 Tips,’ Though Some Are ‘Absolutely Ridiculous,’ Sheriff Says

Florida authorities continue to search for suspects in the brutal slaying of three best friends who were shot to death Friday night while fishing in a "quiet," remote community, as the reward in the case grew to $30,000.

“Our detectives have literally been working 24/7 since the moment we received the first 911 call in order to solve this horrific case,” Polk County Sheriff Grady Judd said in a press conference Monday, calling the triple homicide a “particularly sad” investigation.

Best friends Damion Tillman, 23; Keven Springfield, 30; and Brandon Rollins, 27 were shot to death Friday night around 10 p.m. near a lake off Lake Streety Road, in Frostproof.

As he lay dying, Rollins was able to call his father and get out the word “help.”

Rollins’ father quickly rushed to the area, where he found a brutal scene.

“They are all shot up. It’s a massacre,” Judd said. “He runs to his son’s side and he and his son are there in an intimate moment with his son actively dying and his son is saying some things to him, which obviously we are not releasing to the public at this point in time.”

Cyril Rollins described the emotional moment with his son to local station WFLA shortly after the homicides.

“When I got there, I was looking for my son. It was a mess. I found my son. I was holding him. He was telling me what happened, but I was too shocked,” he said.

In his excitement to get to the scene, Rollins’ father left his cell phone at home and raced to a nearby convenience store to call 911.

All three victims had already died by the time authorities arrived, Judd said.

Investigators are now trying to piece together what happened and have received “well over 100 tips” since the fatal shootings.

“Some of them look promising, some of them are absolutely ridiculous, but hey, we’ll take them all,” Judd said. “We’ll sort through them because we need the information.”

Authorities believe they are likely looking for “more than one” suspect in the case and are urging anyone with information to come forward.

The reward in the case has jumped to $30,000 for any information leading to an arrest—even if the tipster chooses to remain anonymous, Judd said.

“It’s important that we are as a community work together to make sure we get those folks locked up sooner rather than later,” he said.

Neighbors in the area said the lake—although remote—can be a popular spot for people to party on the weekends, but investigators have said they have found “zero evidence” to date to suggest it was a drug deal gone bad or a domestic dispute.

“We don’t know the reason at this stage in the investigation,” Judd said, adding that authorities also didn’t find any sign of theft at the murder scene.

Judd said “there are literally dozens and dozens” of people working around the clock to try to identify the killer or killers in the case.

“We want to be the voice for those young men who lost their voice on Friday when their life was snuffed out by some nasty, evil person or persons,” he said.

According to family members, the three victims had been best friends for years and often went fishing together.

“When anyone loses their life to a murder or for any other tragic reason, it is horrible. But to think these three young men were gunned down, at night, on the way to fish in a very quaint, quiet, safe Frostproof area shocks the conscience of not only the people in Frostproof but, as I’ve learned, (those) throughout the United States,” Judd said.