A man was taken to a hospital after a shooting in Andersonville on Monday morning, authorities said.
The shooting was reported at about 10:08 a.m. Monday on Defoe Road in Andersonville.
A man had gunshot wounds on his leg, said Tyler Mayes, director of administrative services for the Anderson County Sheriff’s Office.
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A woman charged with attempted murder after a stabbing in Anderson County on Friday evening told deputies that she hoped her husband died, according to the Anderson County Sheriff’s Department.
The alleged stabbing was reported on Dutch Valley Road. When ACSD deputies arrived, they found the victim, Harold Duncan, coming out of the home holding a towel on his chest, the Sheriff’s Department said. The towel was soaked with blood, deputies said.
Duncan told ACSD Deputy Kory Blevins that his wife, Pecola Duncan, stabbed him in the chest while he was napping on the recliner.
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The Tennessee Court of Criminal Appeals has upheld the first-degree murder conviction of Norman Lee Follis Jr., 56, of Anderson County, who killed his uncle, Samuel “Sammie” J. Adams, 79, and shoved his body in an apartment closet more than seven years ago. (Photo by John Huotari/Oak Ridge Today)
The Tennessee Court of Criminal Appeals has upheld the first-degree murder conviction of an Anderson County man convicted of killing his uncle and shoving his body into an apartment closet more than seven years ago.
The court upheld the conviction, which led to a lifetime sentence without parole, in a 14-page opinion filed Friday, October 18.
The defendant, Norman Lee Follis Jr., 56, had told a detective that he killed his uncle, Samuel “Sammie” J. Adams, 79, after he saw Adams on top of his girlfriend, groping her and refusing to stop. When he tried to pull his uncle off of his girlfriend, Follis said, his uncle turned and attacked him. Follis said Adams had him down on the floor, and he couldn’t get out from under Adams, so he grabbed the first thing he could, a heater cord, and wrapped it around his uncle’s neck until Adams let go.
Prosecutors characterized Follis’ explanation for the killing—the defense of a third party followed by self-defense—as a story that he latched onto and then elaborated upon during an interview with Anderson County Sheriff’s Department Detective Don Scuglia in January 2012. Two hours of taped interviews with Scuglia were “full of lies,” Tony Craighead, deputy district attorney general in the Seventh Judicial District, said during the trial in May 2016. Prosecutors called it murder, a premeditated killing that profited Follis and his girlfriend, Tammy Sue Chapman, now 51. They said Follis misled family, neighbors, and law enforcement officers about where Adams was that last month—before his body was found in a Patt Lane apartment closet on January 24, 2012—and they cited testimony that Follis sold Adams’ car for $1,000 cash on January 16, 2012.
In his appeal, which was filed last year, Follis argued that the state had failed to prove premeditation and didn’t show that a deadly weapon was used. He said prosecutors didn’t have a declaration of his intent to kill Adams.
But the state and appeals court disagreed, saying premeditation was established by Follis’ actions during and after his uncle’s death. Among other factors, those actions included placing the electrical heater cord around Adams’ neck and using it as a deadly weapon, hiding the body in a closet and pushing a couch in front of the closet door to conceal it, and using his uncle’s car after his death.
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A four-year-old child was accidentally shot in the face by a nine-year-old sibling on Offut Spur Road on Sunday night, law enforcement officers said.
The four-year-old did not have life-threatening injuries and, as of Monday, would not require surgery, the Anderson County Sheriff’s Department said.
A University of Tennessee Lifestar helicopter landed at Lake City Middle School after the accidental shooting on Sunday and flew the child to the hospital.
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One count of attempted first-degree murder and five aggravated assault charges filed against Charles Edward Mason, 52, of Anderson County, were sent to the grand jury after a preliminary hearing in Anderson County General Sessions Court in Clinton on Thursday, July 25, 2019. (Photo by John Huotari/Oak Ridge Today)
KNOXVILLE—An Anderson County man who has two previous homicide convictions and has been accused in state court of trying to kill a deputy this year now faces federal drug and gun charges that could result, depending upon the circumstances, in a lifelong prison sentence.
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Two men have been charged with a Class A felony drug crime after police allegedly found about three ounces of suspected methamphetamine during a search of a vehicle in Oak Ridge in August, according to court records.
Warrants filed in the case said the vehicle, a pickup truck, was searched after agents of the Seventh Judicial District Crime Task Force and officers of the Oak Ridge Police Department conducted surveillance along South Illinois Avenue at about 6 p.m. Monday, August 5.
“A black Chevrolet step-side pickup truck was observed pulling into the parking lot of Big Lots (at) 250 South Illinois Avenue,” the warrants said. “The female driver of the vehicle parked while a male passenger exited and got into the passenger side of a newer model Ford F-150 pickup.”
Agents identified both the driver of the F-150 and the passenger, according to the warrants, which were filed in Anderson County General Sessions Court in Oak Ridge by CTF Agent S. Perry Lewis.
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Bradley Allan Thomas
A Knoxville man was sentenced to 14 years in prison on Thursday after he stole a van from a woman in a wheelchair in the parking lot of the Red Lobster restaurant in Oak Ridge last year. Authorities had alleged that the man pushed the woman out and took the van through force or intimidation while using a deadly weapon (a large knife).
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An Anderson County man has been charged with five drug-related crimes after a search of a home near Rocky Top in February found large amounts of suspected methamphetamine, heroin, and other drugs.
Steven Arthur Seiber, 30, has been charged with manufacturing, delivering, or selling a Schedule II controlled substance: 300 grams or more of methamphetamine. That’s a Class A felony in Tennessee.
Affidavits, which include short narratives describing alleged crimes, said the Seventh Judicial District Crime Task Force in Anderson County found about 18 bags (roughly 18 ounces) of suspected crystal methamphetamine in the master bedroom of a home on Andys Ridge Road during a search Wednesday night, February 13. (There are 28.35 grams per ounce.)
Agents also found about 21 bags (roughly 21 grams) of suspected heroin in the master bedroom, according to the affidavits, which were filed in Anderson County General Sessions Court in Oak Ridge by CTF Director Simon Byrne.
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A 44-year-old man allegedly held a woman hostage with a hammer and reportedly charged at fugitive recovery agents in Powell on Wednesday, the Anderson County Sheriff’s Office said.
There were two Anderson County warrants for Rickey Moore, including a failure to appear, and bail bondsman fugitive recovery agents reported he was holding a woman hostage with a hammer inside a home on Bison Court at about 3:42 p.m. Wednesday, the Sheriff’s Office said.
Moore refused to surrender to the bail agents and reportedly charged at them with a hammer, the Sheriff’s Office said.
“That is when the agents called our office,” said Tyler Mayes, director of administrative services for the Anderson County Sheriff’s Office.
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The investigation of the death of an Oak Ridge man in an apartment in December 2014 remains active and ongoing, a state law enforcement official said Wednesday.
The death of Thomas Steven Thrasher Jr. is being investigated as a homicide. Anyone with information is asked to contact the Tennesssee Bureau of Investigation at (800) TBI-FIND.
In response to questions, TBI spokesperson Leslie Earhart said she could not discuss any potential evidence in the case, including whether a suspect has been identified.
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An Oak Ridge man has been charged with second-degree murder in the drug-related death of another Oak Ridge man in February.
It could be the first time that anyone has been charged with murder, rather than homicide, for a drug-related fatality in Anderson County. There has been a previous case where a man was charged with and convicted of homicide in a drug overdose death.
The man who died on February 6 was Steven Douglas Scruggs, 34.
Indicted in his death was Ronald Nicholas Bunch, 28, of West Wadsworth Circle in Oak Ridge. Bunch’s indictment for second-degree murder on June 4 said he unlawfully and knowingly killed Scruggs through the unlawful distribution of a Schedule II controlled substance, and the drug caused Scruggs’ death. Second-degree murder is a Class A felony in Tennessee.
The charge of second-degree murder, part of a three-count indictment, doesn’t specifically say what drug killed Scruggs. But the second count of the indictment charged Bunch with possessing fentanyl, a Schedule II medication, for resale.
[Read more…]Information from WYSH Radio
A home on Brushy Valley Road in the Heiskell community was destroyed by a fire Wednesday night.
Anderson County Sheriff’s Office Deputy Adam Warren responded to the home shortly before 8:30 p.m. and made contact with the occupants, home owner David Neely and his son Dillon. Both made it out safely.
Warren reported that the house was completely on fire when he arrived, and that while he was on the scene, several explosions could be heard. David Neely explained that his wife, who was not home at the time of the fire, had several oxygen bottles inside and that there was a propane tank on the back porch.
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