Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: TUESDAY, April 12, 1994 TAG: 9404120120
SECTION: CURRENT PAGE: NRV-1 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: By KATHY LOAN STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: CHRISTIANSBURG LENGTH: Medium
Shanks, 30, was indicted earlier this month on charges accusing him of the November beating of a Pulaski County man who remains hospitalized. Shanks and Billy Joe Hampton, who is being held in jail in North Carolina on other charges, are accused of the malicious wounding and robbery of Bobby McDaniel, a Hazel Hollow Road man.
Both men served time for murders they committed as teen-agers.
Shanks also is indicted in Montgomery County on a charge accusing him of the June 1993 robbery of a Blacksburg convenience store. He is scheduled to appear in Pulaski and Montgomery courts later this month to advise judges whether he will retain a lawyer or needs to have one appointed.
Shanks said he does not want a lawyer.
"I did what I did and I'm ready to face punishment," he said.
Shanks was paroled in April 1993 after serving 13 years of a 41-year prison sentence for the 1979 murder of Edward Charles Disney, 17. Shanks was 15 at the time of the murder, had been in and out of foster homes and had been exposed to drugs and alcohol at an early age, according to court records.
Shanks met Hampton in 1980. Hampton was serving time for the 1975 murder of Della Britt Clark, 95, of Montgomery County. Hampton committed the murder when he was 16 and was paroled in 1992.
Hampton, 35, faces numerous charges in North Carolina, West Virginia and Montgomery and Pulaski counties, including rape, carjacking, robbery and malicious wounding. His court date in North Carolina has been set for May 5.
Shanks said last week he wanted to spare his family and McDaniel's family the ordeal of a public trial.
"I intend to deny counsel. I'm just going to go to the gallows silently. I'm not going to fight," Shanks said.
Shanks said he confessed to the McDaniel beating and the Blacksburg robbery because "had I not confessed, there were people waiting to testify against me."
Last Monday, after the Pulaski indictments were returned, Shanks said his actions were the culmination of his frustration at being ill-prepared to re-enter society after spending almost half his life in prison.
by CNB