Canton attack
The craziest story of the day was WLOSer Holly Headache’s story about a pub owner in Canton who told police that some guys broke into his place at 81 Main Street early Monday morning, duct-taped him to a chair, poured a flammable liquid around the place and tried to light the place on fire.
The victim was Arun Krishnan, who has run the place for a few years. Police told Holly people have tried to break in there before, and Krishnan had taken to sleeping in his restaurant to protect it. Krishnan’s friends told Holly that the attack was a hate crime. The attackers were making comments about the color of the victim’s skin and making other racial slurs, Holly said.
Police didn’t say anything.
Polk deputy still recovering
WLOSers said the 16-year-old charged with hitting and injuring a Polk County deputy while fleeing police will be charged as an adult with assault on a government official and DWI. The deputy, R.G. Butler, is still in the hospital.
WCU student arrested
WLOSer Terrie Foster did a follow-up to the arrest in the death of Western Carolina University student Andrew Sides. Foster said Sides’ friend, Brandon Parham, was arrested and charged with voluntary manslaughter in the December shooting death. Foster said police said the two were drinking in celebration of Sides’ birthday and were “looking a gun” when it went off at University Suites Apartments.
Foster said Parham had not returned to school since the shooting. A WCU vice chancellor said he hopes students learn that guns and alcohol and celebrations don’t mix.
The Cliffs of Swannanoa to have golf course
WLOSer Sheraldo said the biggest development in Buncombe County history just got a little bit bigger. The development, which stretches over a mountain ridge and will actually connect Fairview and Swannanoa (that’s scary), will now have a golf course and has added 733 housing units. We think the total is more than 1,500 houses, but we’re not sure. Anyway, Sheraldo was all excited about it.
In other news…
A woman is floating bad checks around town. So far, she’s cashed $11,000 worth. The checks look like they’re from a local building contractor… There was something screwy with U.S. Airways and its reservation system, but everything was fine at the Asheville Regional Airport… The family of a local soldier who was injured in Iraq defended the government and the care that Jonathan Prudin received at Walter Reed Army Medical Center, which is under fire for treating veterans poorly after a Washington Post report…. Gov. Mike Easley says don’t burn things outside because it’s dry and windy… And WLOSers said eight businesses in downtown Brevard will be bulldozed starting in April to build a new fancy shopping center on the corner of French Broad Street.