Baldwin County, Alabama News and Discussion
August 20th, 2009 — Crime, Foley
A Foley man injured Tuesday afternoon in an accident on Ala. 59 was arrested Wednesday after police learned the motorcycle he was riding had been stolen, investigators said.
Anthony Barlow, 21, was flown to Baptist Hospital in Pensacola after the accident at the intersection of Keller Road in Foley, said Lt. Thurston Bullock, patrol division commander.
August 18th, 2009 — Crime, Daphne
The capital murder trial of Troy Robert MacDonald in the strangulation death of Brianna Parish had been tentatively scheduled to start this week but is postponed indefinitely, according to Baldwin County court officials
Last November, a search party found Parish’s nearly nude body in Daphne down the street from a pub parking lot where she had vanished two days earlier.
August 17th, 2009 — Crime, Spanish Fort
As Leslie Eric Buzbee heads to court again this week in the 2007 robbery and fatal bludgeoning of a popular Spanish Fort service station owner, both sides plan generally the same witnesses, testimony and schedule, while hoping for a different outcome.
A mistrial was declared in May, when the jury deadlocked after a monthlong capital murder trial.
Jury selection is set to start Monday in Baldwin County Circuit Judge James Reid’s courtroom
Jury selection set for capital murder trial in Bobby Wilson killing
August 12th, 2009 — Crime, Spanish Fort
A Baldwin County man is being held without bond after his girlfriend is struck and killed during a domestic dispute.
It happened Tuesday night in Spanish Fort along Stagecoach Road near highway 31. Investigators say Lisa Taylor and her 11 year old son were riding home from a party with her boyfriend, Alfred Banks.
According to authorities the two were arguing when Taylor tried to jump out of the moving vehicle. Taylor’s son got out of the truck to help his mother, when Banks drove off. Moments later, Taylor was hit and killed by another car. Investigators say she may have been hit by Banks’ truck, but it is still under investigation.
August 12th, 2009 — Crime, Spanish Fort
A Baldwin County business man brutally beaten and robbed is being remembered on the 2 year anniversary of the attack.
Bobby Wilson was at his service station in Spanish Fort when the crime happened back on August 11th 2007. He died 4 months later from his injuries. Eric Buzbee is facing capital murder charges for robbing and assaulting Wilson. Buzbee will face trial for the second time next week. Family and friends hope justice will finally be served.
August 12th, 2009 — Crime, Spanish Fort
Baldwin County Deputies are investigating a woman’s death. Authorities say a car ran over a woman on Stagecoach Road in Spanish Fort, that’s just off Highway 31. It happened near a street corner around 9:00 p.m Tuesday night.
Deputies are not releasing the woman’s name or who was driving the car.
Authorities are questioning victim’s boyfriend. Investigators believe it all started as a domestic argument. The preliminary investigation appears that the woman got out of the car and was hit. The man drove back to their apartment complex down the road and parked the car. He walked back to check on the victim. Investigators also say an 8 year old child was in the car when it happened. No arrests have been made in the case.
August 10th, 2009 — Crime, Gulf Shores
When Tommy Lunceford Jr. goes on trial next month on arson charges, lawyers for the Gulf Shores businessman will try to shift the focus to his alleged victim, recent filings in Mobile’s federal court suggest.
The November 2007 fire ripped through Lunceford’s commercial building off of Ala. 59, gutting a restaurant located there.
Prosecutors maintain that the former Auburn University punter from the 1960s was motivated, in part, by bad blood between himself and the couple who managed the restaurant
August 10th, 2009 — Crime, Gulf Shores
Prosecutors said Friday that they want to upgrade charges to capital murder for two more of the eight suspects in the deaths of a Panhandle couple known for adopting many children with special needs, and investigators questioned another man about the slayings and said there could be more arrests.
Police questioned Gulf Shores car dealer and businessman Henry Cabell Tice, 61, after he turned himself in at the Escambia County, Fla. Sheriff’s Office on Thursday night, spokesman Ted Roy said.
Tice was arrested on a warrant for writing $17,341 in bad checks to Worldco Financial Services Inc., an auto financing company owned by Byrd and Melanie Billings, who were killed last month.
Gulf Shores businessman questioned in Florida couple’s deaths
August 6th, 2009 — Crime, Loxley
Former Loxley police chief Clifford Bradley Yetter, Jr., has been sentenced to two years of probation for multiple crimes related to his misuse and inappropriate access of confidential computer criminal records, the office of Alabama Attorney General Troy King said in a news release Wednesday.
Yetter, 64, was arrested in April 2008.
He was also fined $2,000 plus court costs and fees after he pleaded guilty to two counts of unauthorized use of a computer to obtain criminal records of individuals through the Law Enforcement Tactical System (LETS) under false pretenses.
August 4th, 2009 — Crime, Robertsdale
The Robertsdale Police Department arrested two men and one woman on meth-related charges Friday morning as a result of what Chief Investigator Sgt. Rex Bishop called “an ongoing investigation.”
Travis Smith, 34, Thomas Williams, 26, and Micheal Victoria Moon, 24, were arrested about 9:30 a.m., each on a charge of manufacturing a controlled substance, police said.
According to Bishop, police executed a search warrant at 20396 Baldwin County 48 in Robertsdale after receiving information concerning methamphetamine production. Both Smith and Moon live at the residence, according to jail records, and Bishop said that Williams, also of Robertsdale, was present at the time of the search
August 4th, 2009 — Crime, Silverhill
All five suspects in a January slaying in Sil verhill have requested youthful offender status.
Authorities found Robert “Bob” Aitcheson dead in his burned-out trailer early on the morning of Jan. 28.
His son, Ian Aitcheson, now 17; Danny Weaver, now 20; Keishjuan Betts, now 19; Amber Darlene Jerkins, now 18, and Amen Lee Robert Wellock, now 18, have been charged in con nection with the slaying
July 28th, 2009 — Crime, Summerdale
Baldwin County sheriff’s deputies following up on a traffic violation arrested the suspect’s father after finding a methamphetamine lab at the residence, officials said today. Deputies were looking for Kevin Curry when they located the lab on Baldwin County 28 in Summerdale on Monday, according to a Sheriff’s Office statement.
A deputy had attempted to stop a driver believed to be Curry for traffic violations and reckless endangerment. The driver fled and got away from the officer. Curry is a not a suspect in the meth case, said Maj. Anthony Lowery, Sheriff’s Office communications director.
Authorities did arrest Curry’s father, James Kevin Puckett, 48, of Summerdale, on charges of first-degree manufacturing a controlled substance and possession of a controlled substance and Jennifer L. Bemis, 32, of Fairhope, who was charged with possession of a controlled substance, according to the statement.
July 27th, 2009 — Crime, Elberta
The Drug Task Force and Elberta PD executed a search warrant at the house of Robert Lynn Weatherford, 36, and his fiancée, Randi Roberts.
One quarter ounce of marijuana, three ounces of cocaine, drug paraphernalia, and $2,139 in cash was seized during the search. $600 of the cash seized was DTF buy money.
Weatherford was arrested and charged with two counts of trafficking in cocaine, second degree possession of marijuana and possession of drug paraphernalia. Weatherford is being held in the Baldwin County Sheriff’s Corrections Center on $2,000,000 bond.
July 26th, 2009 — Bay Minette, Crime
The former bookkeeper of the Southwest Alabama Police Academy was sentenced last week.
Johnnie Vines, 67, of Bay Minette, was sentenced Thursday in Baldwin County Circuit Court after pleading guilty last year of using her office for personal gain and entering into a public funds contract that was not bid out.
Judge J. Langford Floyd sentenced Vines to five years on each count and suspended them for three years of supervised probation.
Former police training academy bookkeeper sentenced
Did she at least have to return the money or is probation the only punishment?
July 25th, 2009 — Crime, Elberta
A father and son from Elberta were arrested this week on charges of manufacturing methamphetamine, Baldwin County authorities said.
Terry Drew Merchant, 58, and Derek Ryan Merchant, 27, were each charged Thursday with second-degree manufacture of a controlled substance, possession of drug paraphernalia and second-degree possession of marijuana
