Freddie Woodruff

Freddie Russell Woodruff (September 14, 1947 – August 8, 1993) was a regional affairs officer at the U.S. Embassy in Tbilisi, Georgia. Earlier in his career he had been posted under diplomatic cover to Berlin, the consulate in Leningrad and in the early 1980s to Ankara followed by a stint in Ethiopia 1987.

Woodruff has been reported as the Central Intelligence Agency station chief involved in training the bodyguards of the Georgian leader Eduard Shevardnadze and an élite Omega Special Task Force.

Death

He was shot in the head and killed in 1993 on a mountain road in the sensitive border area with Ossetia whilst on a "private trip" in a vehicle driven by the Georgian head of security Eldar Gogoladze.

Woodruff was married twice. With his first spouse, he had a daughter and son. He was survived by his second wife, Meredith, a former CIA officer, and their three children, and two sisters, one a nurse in Arkansas. Sharmaidze was alleged to have been a "drunk bandit" and to have randomly shot at Woodruff.