
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SATURDAY, August 19, 1995                   TAG: 9508220027
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: C-3   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: JAN VERTEFEUILLE
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Short

4 INDICTED IN INTERSTATE TRACTOR-THEFT PLOT

Four people were indicted Friday in connection with a theft ring that authorities say moved from state to state looking for lawn tractors to steal.

In a four-count indictment, the four were charged by a federal grand jury in Roanoke with interstate transportation and sale of eight John Deere tractors stolen June 25 from Anderson Tractor and Equipment in Rocky Mount and sold in Lebanon, Ohio.

Franklin County investigators, working with Lebanon police, cracked the case using litter left at the scene of the crime. A discarded bolt cutter was traced by its serial number to the store in Ohio where it was purchased. Bolt cutters aren't a hot item there - only two had been sold at that store in months - and a witness identified one of the purchasers as Michael Clay Simpson, 25.

Simpson, along with his brother, James D. Simpson, 32; Mary Louise Davis Dickerson, 30, and Gregory Cooper were charged with conspiracy to transport and receive stolen motor vehicles across state lines.

Dickerson also was charged with knowingly helping an offender avoid arrest. Her boyfriend is James Simpson, who escaped from a Kentucky jail in March. The pair were arrested July 27 in Delaware.

The stolen tractors are valued at nearly $40,000.

by CNB