FAYETTEVILLE — A Washington County jury has acquitted two men accused of beating a man to death in January.
Jurors deliberated about two hours Wednesday before acquitting 29-year-old Cheyenne Shinault and 36-year-old Terry Don Lankford of second-degree murder. The men were charged in the Jan. 5 death of 49-year-old Kent Thomas Crigler.
Fayetteville police said Shinault and Lankford beat Crigler at an apartment complex, but there were no witnesses to what started the altercation.
State medical examiners said Lankford ultimately died of a heart attack, and that he also had methamphetamine in his system.
Shinault and Lankford argued that they acted in self defense.