Charlotte Criminal Lawyer Blog
J. Bradley Smith of Arnold & Smith, PLLC answers the question “If I have an outstanding warrant, what should I do?”
North Carolina is not the only state that boasts of rich fall foliage painting its Appalachian hillsides and mountains annually. Now one eastern seaboard state is counting on the falling foliage to uncover an accused cop killer.
Eric Frein, a self-described “survivalist” and trained marksman who—according to his father—“doesn’t miss” when he shoots, has been on the run in Pennsylvania’s mountainous Appalachian region since September 12. Police allege Frein shot Cpl. Bryon Dickson to death and critically injured Trooper Alex Douglass outside their Pike County, Pennsylvania barracks.
Frein, who is considered “armed and extremely dangerous,” ambushed the officers and then fled into the forested Poconos Mountains. The Poconos are part of the Appalachian range situated in northeast Pennsylvania.
The search for Frein has dragged on for over a month and, according to officials, it is costing taxpayers in the Keystone State some $1.1 million per day. Before the shooting, Frein lived with his parents in Seneca Lake, Pennsylvania. After his son went missing, Frein’s father told authorities Frein was likely armed with an AK-47 and a .308 rifle with a scope, which were missing from the home.
Frein was trained by his father to shoot the weapons and also knows how to survive in the woods. On September 29, searchers found a cache of food, two pipe bombs and handwritten notes detailing the shootings of Dickson and Douglass when they stumbled on Frein’s recently abandoned hideout.