Man Charged for Hit & Run

A Millers Creek man has been arrested, after he admitted hitting property at two locations on Boone Trail Road with his car and driving off without reporting the wreck. Deputies were called to H. I. S. Auto Sales Monday morning after Jeff Baumgartner arrived at work and found the damage. It appeared a car had run off Boone Trail and hit a fence and several mailboxes belonging to the business and neighbor R. C. Call sometime Sunday night or early Monday. The impact left behind several small pieces from the car, and damaged it so that it was leaking oil. The deputy was able to follow that oil drip north on Boone Trail to a house not far away where he found the car parked out back. The deputy says he was able to match the broken pieces to damage on a Toyota Corolla registered to Spencer Clawson of Millers Creek. The car had no tag, but Clawson's wallet was in it. The home the car was parked behind is owned by Clawson's sister-in-law, April Myers. His cell phone was on the ground not far from the car, as well. The deputy went to Clawson's home and questioning him, getting Clawson to admit his involvement in the incident. He was arrested on traffic charges and on charges related to the property damage.

Homeowner Assistance Program Expanded

Area residents who have lost their jobs may be able to save their homes from foreclosure thanks to a $1.5 million appropriation in the new state budget. The funds will allow the North Carolina Housing Finance Agency and local counseling organizations to expand the Home Protection Pilot Program to include residents from Ashe, Alexander, Watauga and Wilkes Counties, among others.
State Senator Steve Goss, in a news release this morning, says the General Assembly created the Home Protection Pilot Program in 2004 to help workers who lose their jobs as the result of plant closings and other changing economic conditions. So far, it has helped more than 200 families pay their mortgage while they seek jobs or retrain for new ones. Another 300 homeowners have received foreclosure counseling or stays of foreclosure.
Qualifying homeowners can receive zero-interest loans up to $20,000. The loans can be used to either bring a mortgage current or to keep a mortgage current for up to 18 months while the homeowner participates in an approved retraining program. Repayment is deferred for 15 years, unless the home is sold, refinanced or is no longer the principal residence of the owner.

Teen Assaulted, Suspect Unknown

Nobody's sure who assaulted a McGrady teen early yesterday. Family members called EMS and sheriff deputies to the boy's home on William Cleary Road about 2:20 a-m, saying he had been hit by someone outside the house. His mother said Joshua Royal had gotten hurt after going outside a second time in the night to check a noise outside the house. The first time, his mother said, several adults were playing cards in the living room, and when they heard something outside, Joshua walked down the road and back and didn't see anything. A few minutes later, Joshua's mother was looking out the window and saw someone standing in the shadows. Joshua ran outside to confront the person, and was hit in the right side. There's no description of the assailant. Joshua was taken to Wilkes Regional Medical Center by Wilkes EMS.

Car Hacked Up

Apparently someone was pretty angry at a Wilkes woman. Deputies say there was massive damage to her car after he took an axe to it. According to the crime report, the damage to the car included holes in the hood and trunk, all of the side windows being broken out, all four tires slashed, and significant damage to the heads on the engine. The estimate made by the deputy is that the Miller's Creek woman's 1997 Pontiac Grand Am had suffered more than 5-thousand dollars damage. The man suspected of doing the damage is also accused of taking the radio from the car. According to the woman, the car was normally kept in the garage, and the man had a key. In addition, she had found the radio in his garage. A warrant has been issued for his arrest.

Cars Damage Two Business Fences

Two Wilkes businesses say they have had fencing damaged by automobiles recently. In one of the cases, deputies are monitoring to make sure the man who admits hitting the fence pays for the damage. Eric Adams at Mountain View Market reported that property damage Sunday morning, telling deputies a section of chin link fence at the business had been hit the previous night. Adams told deputies he had received information that Randy Snyder, a 24-year old man who lives on Rock Creek Church Road, was responsible. The deputy found Snyder, who said he'd had car trouble and run into the fence accidentally. Snyder agreed to pay for the damage, and no charges have been filed.

In the second similar case, reported at WISCO Monday morning, police were told by an employee that a section of their fence had been hit a couple of times with an auto. This case appears to be intentional, as the impact came from two different angles. The time frame officer have to work with in the case is pretty long -- sometime between 9am Saturday and 5pm Sunday. There were no car parts near the fence as if there had been a wreck. So far, police report no witnesses or suspects. The damage to the fence will cost about 900-dollars to repair.

North Wilkesboro Man Arrested for DWI

According to a Wilkes deputy, a local man is fortunate he's alive, because he was driving on the wrong side of the road for quite a while. Early Sunday morning, the deputy encountered 25-year old Anthony Keel of North Wilkesboro while on routine patrol in the 16-hundred block of Highway 268 East. He saw Keel drive on the wrong side of the road for some distance, nearly forcing the deputy off the road, and when the deputy recovered and got turned around, Keel was still left of center. The deputy lit up his emergency flashers and tried to pull Keel over at Sky View Road. Instead of stopping short of the intersection, Keel pulled past it, and parked the car on the left side of the road, most of the way in the ditch....but not so far that an oncoming car wouldn't have hit it. Keel tested at .15 on the roadside breath test, and blew a .17 when he arrived at the jail. The deputy found an empty bottle of liquor on the floor of the car, just enough left in it to tell it had been consumed recently. Keel was booked on a charge of DWI, one of having an open container, and one of driving left of center.

Mowers, Tiller Stolen

A Millers Creek woman reports the disappearance of several pieces of power lawn equipment from her yard yesterday. Mary Grose says two mowers and a tiller were stolen from behind her home. While she had not secured the items, Grose says only a few people knew she stored the items where she did. The stolen items include a blue Yard Machines riding mower worth 13-hundred dollars, a Cub Cadet self-powered walk-behind mower worth 400-dollars, and a Troy-Bilt rear-time tiller worth 700-dollars. In all, the thief took 24-hundred dollars worth of property. The deputy tried unsuccessfully to make contact with the suspect, and says he checked the yard and didn't find the mowers or tiller. The case remains under investigation.

Woman Assaulted, Man Charged

Wilkes deputies are investigating a report of domestic violence that left a rural North Wilkesboro woman with multiple injuries. She didn't report the incident until several days after it happened, though. In a report released yesterday, Larissa Deann Barnes, a 26-year old who lives on Fairplains Bridge Road, said she had been assaulted several times by a local man whose name is not yet being released. According to the report, much of the abuse happened on July 28th at her house, and included instances of the man beating her, dragging her from place to place by the ankles, putting a finger in her mouth and pulling her from place to place by the cheek. Her injuries included a busted lip, multiple bruises and scratches, and evidence of being restrained around the ankles. At the time of the report, she had already spoken with the DA's office about additional charges against the man, in addition to the ones already filed. Those include assault by strangulation, felonious restraint, and property damage. The property damage comes from a broken cell phone, which Barnes says was broken during the incident. There were multiple witnesses, who have also discussed with deputies what happened at the house. The 25-year old man has not yet been arrested.

Car Reported Stolen

A woman says her car was stolen from the side of Highway 421 late last week. In a report released yesterday, Angie Essie, who lives in Yadkinville, told deputies she had parked her 2005 Dodge Neon along 421 at the Clingman Road exit last Monday and had a friend pick her up. She says she had become sick while she was driving, an there weren't any problems with the car. When she came back Thursday afternoon, the car was not there. The Highway Patrol had not towed the vehicle. The car is a blue 2005 Neon four-door with North Carolina plate WWX-1040, worth about 12-thousand, 500-dollars. It hasn't been seen since, and authorities have no suspects.

Gun Pointed at Woman's Neck

Sheriff deputies have arrested two men, following a series of crimes that ended with the two brandishing guns during an argument over drugs. Marcus Turner and Robert Pena were arrested several hours after the incident Saturday night, which happened at a home on Traphill Road in Hays, owned by Dinah Brady. Deputies were called there just before 11pm Saturday after the men showed up and and demanded their money from a drug deal back. The two had allegedly bought drugs through a third party, Tammy Griffin, earlier in the evening. She had taken them back to Brady's home when they got angry about the drugs for some reason, but said she got scared and ran off from Brady's on foot. The story from another person in the van was that she'd driven the men to the house because of an old debt owed by Miranda Church, who was also at the house. During the disturbance at the house, one of the men is alleged to have held the pistol to Church's neck and demanded the money back. It's not clear from the crime report if they actually got the money, or left when they were told deputies had been called.