Suspect arrested in killings of abandoned Tennessee baby’s relatives
This photo provided by the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation shows Austin Robert Drummond. Following a weeklong manhunt across rural northwest Tennessee
By John Miller, Chris Boyette, CNN
(CNN) — The suspect in the killings of four relatives of a baby found abandoned last week has been arrested after a weeklong manhunt across rural Tennessee, according to police in Jackson.
Austin Robert Drummond, 28, was caught in a wooded area Tuesday morning after being spotted by residents, according to a senior law enforcement official. He was taken into custody shortly after 8 a.m. CT, the official said.
The capture came after law enforcement ordered certain residents to shelter in place due to a sighting in the area. Drummond was captured on a resident’s camera system in Jackson Sunday night, police there said. Jackson is the same western Tennessee city where authorities say a vehicle associated with him was found unoccupied during the manhunt for him last week.
Drummond was wanted in connection with the deaths of James M. Wilson, 21; Adrianna Williams, 20; Cortney Rose, 38; and Braydon Williams, 15, whose bodies were found July 29 in Tiptonville, a town in northwest Tennessee’s Lake County, the TBI said.
Warrants had been issued for Drummond charging him with four counts of first-degree murder, one count of aggravated kidnapping, four counts of felon in possession of a firearm, and one count of possession of a firearm during the commission of a dangerous felony, the TBI said.
The four were found dead on July 29, hours after the baby daughter of Wilson and Adrianna Williams had been found abandoned in a car seat in a “random” front yard near the Dyer County community of Tigrett, a nearly 40-mile drive southeast of Tiptonville, authorities said.
Rose was the baby’s maternal grandmother, and Braydon Williams was the baby’s maternal uncle, according to Danny Goodman, district attorney for Dyer and Lake counties. The baby girl is approximately 7 months old, Goodman said.
This is a developing story and will be updated.
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CNN’s Hanna Park, Rebekah Riess, Gene Norman and Taylor Romine contributed to this report.
