Authorities in Madison County were searching Tuesday for a man suspected of threatening to kill a neighbor and pointing a shotgun at him.
Teral Michael Garrett, 59, was charged Monday in a Madison County Circuit Court warrant with aggravated assault, first-degree terroristic threatening and being a felon in possession of a firearm after having been convicted of murder, all felonies.
A news release from Madison County Sheriff Rick Evans' office Tuesday said searchers were out all night Sunday into Monday searching for Garrett. As of 5 p.m. Tuesday, he remained at large and the search continued.
The release said a neighbor, identified in the criminal charges as Jeffery Pearson, reported Garrett pointed a shotgun at him and threatened to kill him Sunday. Responding officers searched Garrett's cabin where Pearson said he saw Garrett enter but found that he had fled into the woods.
Officers and a dog team searched the area through the night but couldn't locate Garrett, the release said.
Pearson was advised to leave his home for his safety, according to the release. When he returned about 7 a.m. Monday, he found Garrett's cabin on fire with no one inside.
A sighting of a man matching Garrett's description was reported about 9:30 a.m. Tuesday about a half-mile from Garrett's cabin wearing a trench coat, boots and a cowboy hat, the release said.
The sheriff's office said Garrett should be considered armed and dangerous and the public was warned not to approach him but to call 911 or the sheriff's office.
Court records show Garrett was convicted of second-degree murder in 1997 in Franklin County and sentenced to 30 years in prison.
Then a resident of Mulberry, Garrett was accused in the April 1996 fatal shooting of Joe Don Stephenson, 35, of Chester during an argument in a rural area north of Ozark. Both men were drunk, according to court records.
Stephenson was shot once in the face and his body was found in a roadside ditch on Arkansas 215. Garrett's pickup was found burned about 14 miles from the body. In Garrett's April 1997 jury trial, the state contended Garrett was trying to hide his guilt by burning the pickup.
Garrett testified during the trial that he was outside the pickup when he heard a gunshot and found Stephenson slumped over the seat inside the pickup. He claimed Stephenson shot himself.
State Desk on 04/25/2018