Tag: Murder Charges

Weekend Arrangements Set for Slain West Virginia Coal CEO

Slain coal executive Bennett Hatfield will be buried this weekend in southern West Virginia.

His obituary says friends can visit the family at River Ridge Church in Charleston on Saturday evening.

The funeral will be Sunday afternoon at the Regional Church of God at Delbarton.

The 59-year-old will be buried at Mountain View Memory Gardens in Maher, where he was found dead Monday.

Police say two men charged in Hatfield’s death wanted to steal his vehicle and sell it.

Authorities say Hatfield was visiting his wife’s gravesite at the graveyard when he was shot and killed. His SUV was found nearby.

Twenty-year-old Anthony Arriaga and eighteen-year-old Brandon Lee Fitzpatrick are charged with first-degree murder.

Hatfield resigned last year as president and CEO of Patriot Coal.

Judge Dismisses Charges in Cold Case

A West Virginia judge has dismissed first-degree murder charges against two men in a 1999 cold case.

Media outlets report that Lewis County Circuit Court Judge Jake Reger on Thursday granted a special prosecutor’s motion to dismiss the charges against 40-year-old Joseph Edward Metz of Horner and 52-year-old Charles Stephen Freeman of Archbold, Ohio.

Special prosecutor Laura Pickens said a third defendant, 58-year-old David Martin Hughes, made several conflicting statements and lacks credibility.

Hughes had pleaded guilty in 2014 to conspiracy to commit armed robbery. Under the plea agreement, Hughes was to cooperate with prosecut

  ors in exchange for a recommendation of probation.

Metz and Freeman were charged with killing 69-year-old Maxine Stalnaker and her daughter, 46-year-old Mary Friend, both of Jane Lew. The women disappeared on Dec. 1, 1999.

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