Deputies ID suspects captured in Dyer Co. manhunt
DYER COUNTY, Tenn. — The sheriff’s office has identified the three suspects captured after a multi-agency manhunt in Dyer County.
From left: Noel, Stewart and Mittlestadt
Veronica Mittlestadt, 23, of Newbern, Cody Noel, 26, of Dyersburg, and Larry Stewart, 24, of Dyersburg, are in custody after deputies say they were in a stolen car that crashed Tuesday afternoon on Sorrell Chapel Road near Highway 412.
All three are charged with theft over $10,000. Their bond amounts have not been set at this time.
Mittlestadt was taken into custody shortly after the crash.
Noel later called dispatch on a cell phone and told them he wanted to turn himself in, according to Sheriff Jeff Box.
Crime Stoppers got a tip Wednesday morning that Stewart was hiding in a home on Peach Street in the nearby Fowlkes community, according to the sheriff’s office. Deputies conducted a search of the home just before 9 a.m. and found Stewart hiding in the attic.
Sheriff Box says he thinks the owner of the residence on Peach Street is somehow related to one of the suspects.
The sheriff’s office says the incident began when a resident called them about someone pulling up to their Coker Road home in a black Ford Edge SUV and behaving suspiciously.
Deputies contacted the Tennessee Highway Patrol for assistance, and troopers thought the SUV matched the description of a vehicle stolen from a Millington car dealership.
A Dyer County investigator later spotted the vehicle on Frank Maynard Boulevard in Dyersburg and began a pursuit.
The SUV drove on Highway 104 East then to Highway 412 toward Jackson. The vehicle then turned onto Sorrell Chapel Road where the investigator lost contact.
A THP helicopter then found the SUV off road driving through a field and then into a wooded area where all three subjects fled on foot, according to the sheriff’s office.
Investigator Rick Gregory of the Dyer County Sheriff’s Office who initiated the pursuit of the suspects is seen processing the vehicle in the department’s impound yard.
Agencies set up a perimeter and took Mittlestadt into custody a few hundred yards away from the vehicle.
Around 7 p.m., Noel called dispatch and said he wanted to turn himself in. Deputies told him to come out of the woods with his hands up and then took him into custody.
The search for Stewart continued into Wednesday until Crime Stoppers received the tip about his whereabouts.
