Suspect arrested in 2 Cherokee Village killings
A 24-year-old Cherokee Village man has been arrested in two slayings over the weekend.
Charles Paul Stovall confessed to killing two people and injuring a third, according to a news release from Sharp County Sheriff Mark Counts.
The two slayings occurred in Cherokee Village, according to the release.
Arkansas State Police investigators were called to the scene of one of the killings before noon on Monday, according to a news release from that agency.
At a residence on Warpath Drive in Cherokee Village, authorities found the body of Hayleigh Gruger, 23.
While processing that crime scene, state police investigators were sent to a second crime site on FM Road in Highland, southeast of Cherokee Village.
“Debra Compton, 41, was transported from the Highland address to an area hospital where she is being treated for a stab wound sustained while she was in a vehicle with two men traveling in the area,” according to the state police. “One of the men fled the crime scene and was later taken into custody by State Police special agents. The 24 year-old man is considered a suspect in the attack on Compton and the deaths of Gruger and a third woman.”
Late Monday, Sharp County deputies and state police special agents found the body of Linda Janny, 72, in her home on Lakeshore Drive in Cherokee Village.
“The bodies of Gruger and Janny have been transported to the Arkansas State Crime Laboratory where autopsy examinations have begun to determine when the deaths occurred and each victim’s manner and cause of death,” according to the state police.
Stovall is being held in the Sharp County jail awaiting formal charges, according to Counts.
Stovall had previous con
victions in Sharp County for burglary, theft of property and drug offenses.
On Oct. 14, a Highland police officer served Stovall with a warrant at a Dollar General store, according to a filing in Sharp County Circuit Court.
The warrant for revocation of a suspended prison sentence was issued in 2018 and stemmed from a 2015 arrest.
On Nov. 5, 2018, Stovall received a five-year suspended sentence for possession of a controlled substance and a five-year suspended sentence for possession of drug paraphernalia, according to a petition for revocation.
“The defendant violated the terms of his suspended imposition of sentence by incurring subsequent criminal charges and by failing to pay his court fees/fines/restitution as ordered by the court,” according to the document, which was written by Tom Garner, who was deputy prosecuting attorney at the time.
It was signed by a judge on Nov. 22, 2018.
On Nov. 15, 2018, Stovall was arrested on drug charges while attempting to enter the emergency room at UAMS Medical Center in Little Rock. After being asked to place items from his pockets in bins at a metal detector, Stovall placed “what appeared to be controlled narcotics in one of the bins,” according to a report from hospital police Sgt. Bradley Jones.
Stovall was charged with possession of methamphetamine, LSD, marijuana and drug paraphernalia. He was also charged with resisting arrest.
Stovall pleaded guilty and was sentenced to six years in prison. He was paroled in August, according to records.