ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Tuesday, January 23, 1996 TAG: 9601230082
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-1 EDITION: METRO
DATELINE: WYTHEVILLE
SOURCE: PAUL DELLINGER STAFF WRITER
Two men were arraigned Monday on charges in the death of 17-year-old Ricky Lee Coleman, although authorities still don't know how or exactly when he died.
An autopsy on Coleman, a former Pulaski County resident who in recent months had been living with his mother at Carter's Trailer Park in Max Meadows in Wythe County, is scheduled today.
Jason Dennis Hibbs, 19, and Eric Dwayne Ball, 20, both of Max Meadows, have been charged with abduction and first-degree murder in Coleman's death.
A 17-year-old has been charged as a juvenile with abduction.
Coleman's mother reported him missing Saturday. She said he had been gone since Thursday, though he was supposed to have been staying with a friend.
Sgt. Mike Evans of the Wythe County Sheriff's Office was among those interviewing people with whom Coleman was associated or had been seen.
Witnesses told Evans that Coleman and Hibbs got into a fight Thursday night at a party at Hibbs' house.
Coleman "turned the television over and broke a lamp, and Jason asked him to leave." said Hibbs' father, Howard Hibbs. "This is what Jason told us. ... They were drinking some vodka."
Lt. Col. Doug Cooley of the Sheriff's Office said Coleman's associates gave conflicting statements, but enough information was obtained to send searchers into a remote area of Wythe County to look for Coleman on Saturday.
Witnesses said that after the fight, Coleman was put in the trunk of a car wrapped in a blanket, then thrown over a creek bank in the eastern section of the county.
Searchers found the blanket Saturday night and recovered Coleman's body early Sunday along a creek off Virginia 610. The arrests followed.
But Cooley said authorities couldn't determine whether Coleman died from injuries sustained in the fight, or from exposure, drowning in the creek, or in some other manner.
Temperatures dropped drastically - to below freezing - during the day Friday.
The autopsy is the only way to determine the cause of death.
"That's what we're anxiously awaiting. That's going to be the determining factor in a lot of things in this case," Cooley said.
The extent of the involvement of Ball and the juvenile is another conflict in the various statements given by those charged, he said.
"At the very least, they are accessories to an abduction, or, if he was dead [when he was left in the remote area], they're going to be accessories after the fact" to murder, Cooley said.
Tracking dogs had been called in to try to find Coleman early Sunday, but it turned out they were not needed once it got light enough to see the general area. Searchers had tried using floodlights Saturday night without success.
The area where Coleman was dropped, alive or dead, is in a sparsely populated part of the county.
Investigators from the Sheriff's Office tracked down leads and interviewed people all weekend and through Monday, Cooley said.
LENGTH: Medium: 62 lines KEYWORDS: FATALITYby CNB