The family of murder victim Megan Sharpton has gained some additional support in trying to locate the people involved in the murder. CNN’s Nancy Grace is scheduled to talk about the murder on Monday. In the meantime investigators from the Franklin County Sheriff’s Department continue to gather evidence and talk with individuals about the murder of the young nursing student. The family says that they have collected several donations and they have two anonymous donors who plan to each donate $5,000.
Category: News
CNN To Do Story On Tullahoma Murder Victim
Scam Working Around The State
State officials are warning about a scam in which perpetrators offer to arrange payments of consumers’ utility bills. The Tennessee Regulatory Authority says scammers ask for Social Security numbers or other personal information. The scammers, in exchange, provide phony bank account numbers and bank routing numbers they say would be used to pay bills online. Officials say the perpetrators tell people it’s a special federal program to pay such bills. The bogus information is being disseminated through social media, email, text messages and in-person solicitations.
TRA chairman Kenneth Hill described the scammers as “bad actors in the marketplace.”
Unemployment Rate Goes Up Again In Tennessee
Tennessee’s unemployment rate rose 0.2 percent in June to 8.1 percent.
Karla Davis, commissioner of Labor & Workforce Development, said Thursday the June figure was the highest since January. But it was substantially below the 9.4 percent in June a year ago. Government and educational services combined declined by 17,400 jobs. After seasonal adjustments, total jobs (excluding agriculture) decreased by 12,100. The national jobless rate for June was 8.2 percent. Tennessee has been below the national figure for six months.
Electronic Textbooks Headed To Tullahoma Classrooms
Tullahoma Director of Schools Dan Lawson
The cost will be about $900,000. Lawson said the system can fund the purchases with the $300,000 annually it would normally spend on hardcover textbooks.
Lawson said the electronic textbooks can have their educational material tailored to local level issues which would increase student interest in subjects. He used an example that someone like Dr. Michael Bradley, a noted Civil War historian from Tullahoma, could provide information about the Tullahoma Campaign. He added the approach would provide a local touch to the students’ learning process.
Manchester Crash Injures One
Wreck scene picture provided by Barry West
Wednesday afternoon around 4:15pm, a local woman said her accelerator hung causing her to hit another car and then the large Marathon sign at the corner of Ragsdale Road and McMinnville Hwy. The woman driver was transported to Medical Center of Manchester complaining of leg pain. The woman in the other vehicle was not hurt.
Manchester Police Department was in charge of the scene.
Sales Tax Collections Up Again
Sales tax collections in June were up in Manchester and Tullahoma along with the county. In Tullahoma June collections in 2011 were $751,837 and last month Tullahoma collected $838,524, increasing $86,686. In the county tax collection were up again after being down slightly in May. For June Coffee County collected $829,553 compared to $805,040 June 2011. The City of Manchester saw another month with sales tax collections going up, this time $56,311 over June of 2011 with $651,504 collected. Overall net county collections were $2.3(M) for June 2012.
Police And The Sharpton Family Needs Your Help
Erika Megan Sharpton
The 24-year-old Tullahoma nursing student’s beaten and burned body was discovered just off Awalt Road in Franklin County by a passerby around 1:15 a.m. on the morning on July 2.
Her Ford Mustang was found later that day parked in the middle of Three Forks Bridge Road in Bedford County.
The vehicle was taken to the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation’s crime lab in Nashville for processing. Her family is hoping anyone with information will come forward and help give them closure. Call the Franklin County Sheriff’s Department at 967 2331 or the TBI at 1-800-TBI-Find.
Anyone interested in donating to the reward fund, which has reached $10,000, or buying a t-shirt, can email Sharpton’s sister-in-law, Lindsay Foutch at Lindsay.Foutch@gmail.com. Donations to the reward fund can be made at any location of American City Bank.
A Facebook page has also been set up in her honor
ATA To Ask For Voluntary Reduction In Staff
The lead contractor at Arnold Air Force Base, Aerospace Testing Alliance (ATA), announced it will offer a voluntary reduction in force (VRIF) to its employees this week.
The voluntary reduction in force allows interested employees to voluntarily request a layoff, often meaning the company faces fewer involuntary or forced layoffs. Budget and skill mix issues are the reasons for the voluntary reduction in force.
ATA General Manager, Steve Pearson, says it is too early to know if there will be an involuntary layoff later in the year.
“We are better off than we thought we would be at this point, but it is too early to declare victory,” he said. ATA employs 1,850 people.
Smoky Mountains Getting More Visitors
The Great Smoky Mountains National Park is running more than 11% ahead of 2011 visits for the first half of this year.
Park officials said Wednesday that June visitation was up 7.2% – a total of 1,202,056 visitors to the 500,000-acre park on the Tennessee-North Carolina border. The year-to-date figure is up 11.5% over the first six months of 2011. That means an additional 410,767 people have come into the park this year.
A Smokies spokeswoman said the park is also 3.6% ahead of the 5-year average for park visits.
Goodwin Laid To Rest
Funeral procession for Dale Goodwin... Photo by Sara Blackburn
Coffee County Mayor David Pennington said on Thunder Radio on Wednesday that Goodwin will be missed by all that knew him. Pennington added Goodwin was known to many as a very good antique collector.
Goodwin, a Lieutenant with the department, also served time as a patrol deputy and was a veteran of the U.S. Army.
Many current and former students at Coffee County High School have sent condolences over Facebook throughout the week.
Yesterday nearly 30 emergency vehicles were in the funeral procession.
