Trooper killing suspect
faces six more indictments

WAYNESVILLE — Six new charges have been lodged against a suspect in the killing of a N.C. Highway Patrol trooper, including attempted murder of a Haywood County sheriff’s detective.

A grand jury handed up six new indictments on July 7 against Edwardo Wong III, 37, of Florida. The new charges include three counts of possession of a firearm by a felon, possession with the intent to sell marijuana, possession with the intent to sell the drug ecstasy and attempted first-degree murder of detective Bruce Warren.

Wong previously had been indicted on a first-degree murder change in the killing of Trooper David Shawn Blanton Jr. and a robbery after investigators reportedly discovered Blanton’s gun in Wong’s vehicle.

Wong is believed to have shot Blanton, 24, twice during a June 17 traffic stop on Interstate 40 near Canton. Blanton later died at Mission Hospitals in Asheville.

Tasered man died of ‘excited
delirium,’ autopsy claims

HENDERSONVILLE — A man repeatedly shocked while in handcuffs at the Henderson County jail died from “excited delirium” because of physical restraint and cocaine toxicity, a state autopsy asserted on July 7.

Alcohol also was involved in the death of Stefan D. McMinn, who had traits of sickle cell disease and a partially collapsed lung, the autopsy performed by Dr. Patrick Lantz indicated.

McMinn, 44, of Hendersonville died Nov. 2 after being shocked about six times by two deputies at the Henderson County jail.

He went into cardiac arrest minutes after being shocked with a Taser and was taken to a hospital, where he was declared dead.

In previous interviews, Henderson Sheriff Rick Davis has said that McMinn was combative while being booked on charges of being drunk and disruptive and resisting arrest.

McMinn was arrested at a motel after the owner said he was out of control and had jumped out of a second-story window.

Henderson District Attorney Jeff Hunt had stated in March that the death did not warrant criminal charges against the two deputies, based on a report by the State Bureau of Investigation.

“Excited delirium” is a controversial diagnosis used only to explain deaths in police custody, civil-liberties groups note. It is not recognized by the American Medical Association.

N. Henderson High teacher
faces six more sex charges

HENDERSONVILLE — Six new charges were filed July 11 against a North Henderson High School teacher who previously charged in Buncombe County with soliciting sex from a child over the Internet.

David Frank Pace, 57, of Hendersonville was charged in Guilford County with two counts of solicitation of a minor by computer for sex, according to the Guilford County Sheriff’s Office.

In addition, authorities in Greenville, S.C., have taken out warrants charging Pace with four counts of criminal solicitation of a minor.

Pace is accused of chatting online with Guilford deputies on June 13 and 30. Two other state teachers were charged with soliciting a child by computer in Guilford.

Two of the suspects reportedly contacted a deputy posing as a 13-year-old girl, and the third contacted one posing as a 14-year-old girl.

Pace remained in the Buncombe County jail on July 11 under a $190,000. bond He was arrested on July 8 in Buncombe after investigators said he chatted on the Internet with undercover investigators posing as an 11-year-old girl.

South Carolina authorities have placed a hold on Pace when he is released from the Buncombe jail, officials noted.

Pace had taught at North Henderson High since 1993, beginning as an electronics teacher before becoming a vocational carpentry teacher.

Pace, who was described by school officials as a good hard worker who never had any complaints lodged against him, will not be allowed in a classroom or near children until the case is resolved, authories said.

If convicted, Pace could lose his North Carolina teaching license.

Anti-gay attack alleged;
activists call for hot-line

Two robbers reportedly used anti-gays slurs while attacking a man in downtown Asheville just after midnight on July 6.
The attack near O. Henry and Haywood Streets has spurred calls for a hot line for hate-crime victims.

The vicim reported that two men punched and kicked him, and pulled him down after he tried to scale a fence. They fled with his wallet after he fought them off with a pocketknife and stabbed one of them, he said.

After word of the attack spread among Asheville’s gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered community, a meeting was held July 9 at the Firestorm Café in downtown Asheville. Activists there called for telephone hot lines to be created for victims of anti-gay crimes to report them to police or to receive crime-victim services.

Although anti-gay crimes are the second most reported type of bias-driven crime after race, according to Ian Palmquist of Equality North Carolina, the state has no legal protections for gays, and its laws do not include sexual orientation as a protected category.

Hawaii man gets maximum
in killing of ex-Enka student

HONOLULU, Hawaii — A Hawaii man will face a maximum of 20 years in prison following his conviction on July 10 in the one-punch killing of a former Enka (N.C.) High School student last year.

Prosecutor Darrell Wong had sought the maximum penalty of 20 years or less in his case against Less Schnabel Jr., 23.

Christopher Reuther, a former Enka resident, had spent only eight hours in Hawaii when he was punched at Nanakuli Beach Park.

Reuther, 34, died two days after the incident, which occurred just before midnight April 22, 2007.

He had gone to the islands to visit the William S. Richardson School of Law at the University of Hawaii.

An honors graduate from UNC Chapel Hill who had been working as a magazine photojournalist, Reuther had been offered a partial scholarship to enroll in the environmental law program.

Wong said Reuther’s mother, Judy Wilson, was overcome with emotion when he told her of the verdict in Honolulu.

Reuther attended Enka High for two years before transferring to the North Carolina School of Science and Mathematics in Durham.

Prosecution witnesses in the manslaughter trial testified that Schnabel punched Reuther once in the side of the head and said the attack was unprovoked. Reuther reportedly fell unconscious to the ground and died two days later of a lacerated artery at the base of his brain.

Various witnesses said Schnabel was angry after Reuther unexpectedly took a photograph of him in the parking lot, and that he twice told Reuther to leave. Witnesses described a nighttime world of drugs and violence at the park, and several had warned Reuther it was unsafe for a tourist to be there after dark.