Posted on 05/12/2019 2:02:24 PM PDT by buckalfa
WYTHE COUNTY, Va. - One of the two victims in Saturday morning’s machete attack on the Appalachian Trail has died and law enforcement has now named the suspect under arrest.
A spokesman for the Department of Justice said Sunday that 30-year-old James Jordan was arrested in the early morning hours Saturday. He faces federal charges that include murder and assault with the intent to murder.
The spokesman said Sunday that one of the victims has died. 10 News previously reported that investigators said one of the victims, a female, was expected to survive the attack, while the condition of the other, a male, was unknown.
The investigation is ongoing, the spokesman said.
Jordan is scheduled to have an initial appearance in federal court in Abingdon, Virginia, Monday morning.
“I commend local law enforcement in Wythe and Smyth Counties for mobilizing successful rescue and tactical operations in this remote region,” U.S. Attorney Cullen said in a statement. “Thanks to their efforts, the suspect was safely apprehended and a seriously wounded victim received critical medical care.”
Jordan is from West Yarmouth, Massachusetts.
As 10 News has previously reported, investigators said Saturday that the suspect attacked a man and a woman with a machete while they two were hiking together on the Appalachian Trail near Crawfish Road.
Wythe County Sheriff Keith Dunagan told 10 News investigators are still searching the trail, worried that there may be more victims.
Jordan faced charges after a separate altercation on the Appalachian Trail in April, during which he threatened hikers in North Carolina and Tennessee. He is also known by his trail name “Sovereign.”
Original story: Two people were assaulted on the Appalachian Trail early Saturday morning, according to Wythe County Sheriff Keith Dunagan, who told 10 News one person is in custody. That suspect is now facing federal charges.
Investigators say the suspect attacked a man and a woman with a machete, while they were hiking together on the trail near Crawfish Road. Dunagan said the female victim will survive the attack. Law enforcement could not comment on the condition of the male victim.
Between 3:30 and 4 a.m. Saturday, Wythe County deputies were alerted about a man threatening Appalachian Trail hikers. Two hikers reported to the Bland County Sheriff's Office that there was a man with a machete assaulting people on the trail in Wythe County.
The male victim was found in Wythe County using GPS technology, after he sent out an emergency notification on his cellphone.
"They pinged it on the Wythe County side of the trail. So, the phone company notified us and that's when we went up there and found the suspect and the victim," Dunagan said. "We had our whole [tactical] team out there, so he wisely just surrendered himself."
Deputies found a machete on the trail that they believe the supsect was using.
Dunagan said the female victim was found in Smyth County after walking six miles -- injured and bleeding-- before finding a couple of hikers and calling for help.
The suspect was taken to a jail in Wythe County. Saturday evening, he was then transported by federal authorities to a jail cell in Washington County.
The sheriff's office would not release the suspect's name. However, the sheriff tells NBC affiliate WCYB in Bristol, Va. that this attack is connected to another altercation on the Appalachian Trail in April.
In that incident, James Jordan, 30, was charged with criminal impersonation and drug possession after police say he threatened other hikers on the trail in North Carolina and Tennessee.
Jordan, also known by his trail name 'Sovereign,' was released from jail, put on probation and ordered to pay fines.
Dunagan described the incident as "isolated." However, investigators worry there may be more victims and are searching the trail.
Virginia State Police confirmed to 10 News that troopers have assisted in the investigation. The U.S. Forest Service and FBI are also assisting.
U.S. Forest Service officials said about 18 miles of the Appalachian Trail is expected to remain closed on the Smyth and Bland County ends coming into Wythe until 6 a.m. Sunday.
The closure is about from the Mount Rogers National Recreation Area office to the Eastern Divide Ranger District boundary.
The section of the Appalachian Trail that runs through Wythe County is about a mile long and is located in the west region of the county.
Genetic mapping has provided a clue about human vulnerablity to each of these drugs-— both marijuana/THC (the DEA described Class I, though is non-narcotic), and ethanol/alcohol. There is absolutely no doubt about population subsets highly susceptible to either individual agent, dependent on genetic region “dosing” which are proven altered by the environmental chemicals.
Schizophrenia ID’d sites have been studied extensively in the UK, affecting permanent brain cell development alterations in non- mature growing brains up to age of maturity (minimum age 24) with marijuana/THC in populations of chronic use.
With alcohol, entire population groups/genomes have deep susceptibility and lack of metabolic processing (for example: Pima Indians, East Asian population subgroups, Iberian/Celtic gene markers in populations with high alcoholism addiction.
Neither of these are in any dispute- not in modern medicine. What adults, past brain development stages do, is of course their own business— until it no longer is just their business when visited upon others— violence, automotive accidents, motor cortex degradation/ loss of impulse controls. The kind of things which should not be allowed in the transportation industry (which btw also outlaws non-treated Type II diabetes for the potential insulin/sugar collapse, say in commercial trucking or air freight driver).
Cannot “wash away” scientific progress made in the study of these recreational agents. Again— don’t care what adults do at home- but it becomes a societal issue when you have the social impact of people provably out of control. The law must respond.
30-year-old James Jordan... faced charges after a separate altercation on the Appalachian Trail in April, during which he threatened hikers in North Carolina and Tennessee. He is also known by his trail name “Sovereign.”
Trail name? Yeah, ok. That's a bad trail name to have to pronounce after the other inmates have knocked the teeth out of his head for reasons best left unsaid. Thanks buckalfa.
Yes.
I’ve been on the AT in NJ and the lower part in NY, and don’t see these types; it may just be too cold (even in the summer, the nights get chilly in our mountains). Friends who have hiked other parts describe “Have you seen me?” signs posted along the AT - very creepy...
It might just look like that. I think it might also be a Tyvek jumpsuit from one of the CSI’s, who probably took all his clothes.
“Friends who have hiked other parts describe “Have you seen me?” signs posted along the AT - very creepy...”
Not as creepy as you think. Check out the 411 book series. The author started looking into those types of disappearances, and found they clustered, and even weirder, a *lot* of them had strange circumstances, like the person was there is full view one second, and in a moment vanished completely, and then was found in a strange place not easily accessible, too far from where they disappeared to have gotten there on foot.
He claimed some Rangers would only say off the record there was a coverup of the disappearances, and he felt there was some pseudo-paranormal explanation for it, like UFO’s, or some high-tech government thing. He found so many he had to begin doing sequels.
There have been strange cases too where the person was found, disoriented, and not remembering what happened. The guy who created the biggest discovery in DNA science, Kary Mullis, and his daughter both had separate experiences like that. He may have found something out, because he had cryptically said of the event, something like, “It was anthropology, of a scale we can not begin to imagine.” He wouldn’t say anything else.
Very few ever see the full world from their cubicle. It could be a lot weirder than we know.
If you go on the AT without a gun you have a death wish. Meth heads are everywhere on the AT here in N GA.
You can’t carry legally on the AT. How many states do you pass through that would not allow concealed carry? I would never do it without a gun. We carry on small hikes in the Poconos.
Any word on Mark Sanford?
Forget the law. The AT in GA is thick with the meth heads which is probably what that Sovereign guy was. Mr. GG2 and his buddy were up there a couple of years ago for the day and ran into to some real freaks. They were both carrying thank God.
Good point. Do those tyvek overalls have no front buttons and do the front center panels expand up to a large rolled “collar” around the back of the head— like an Elizabethan age undershirt? That’s where my observation was coming from- having a couple of actor’s (expensive handmade) shirts from long ago Shakespeare plays.
The shirt appears to have front ties, not buttons, also. Speculate the delusions of the “Sovereign” of the Appalachian Trail. There are quite a lot of drugged up loons living in the mtns, in deference to renting a shack and ... working. Fat of the land type enviro-loonies who hate all people— and drugged bipolars. Clinically speaking, from experience.
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