Murfreesboro, Tennessee

From Murfreesboro’s The Daily News Journal of February 9, 2007

Police: Shootout started as social gathering

The two men who allegedly robbed two residents of Campus Crossings South before being shot themselves were invited in by a resident of the apartment complex, police said.

Three men were shot and one died Jan. 14 in Apartment 506 of the complex on South Rutherford Boulevard in southeast Murfreesboro.

"Evidently, it was a social gathering that turned into the aggravated assault and kidnapping," Murfreesboro Police spokesman Alvin Baird said Thursday.

Baird said the two alleged perpetrators had been invited into the apartment of Mike Holt, 22, prior to the alleged kidnappings and assaults.

Initial reports had indicated that that the two, Thomas John Eckerle Jr., 29, and Alan B. Bell, 21, had forced their way into the home with handguns.

Eckerle was arrested two weeks ago on two counts of aggravated robbery and two counts of especially aggravated kidnapping for his part in the robbery of Holt and Chris Deberry, 23.

Eckerle and Deberry were both treated for multiple gunshot wounds, and Bell died of multiple gunshot wounds at the scene.

Deberry, who is out of the hospital and being treated on an outpatient basis, told police he started firing at Bell and Eckerle when they put down their handguns to tie up him and Holt.

Holt, the apartment's resident, received blunt trauma to the head and was treated and released from an area hospital the same day.

A preliminary hearing in Eckerle's case has been set for Feb. 20 in General Sessions Court.

Police found a white powder believed to be drugs in the apartment and have said the incident is drug-related.

Baird said Thursday that unless other facts emerged in the course of the investigation no further charges are expected to be filed.