WILLIAMSON, W.Va. (AP) — The man suspected of killing a West Virginia sheriff as he ate lunch in his car was mentally disturbed and had no particular vendetta with law enforcement, his father told The Associated Press on Thursday.
Melvin Maynard said his 37-year-old son, Tennis Melvin Maynard, was exposed to harmful chemicals and injured while working at an Alabama coal mine. He most likely did not target Mingo County Sheriff Eugene Crum, he said.
"He would have probably shot anybody, the first one he come to, you know what I'm saying?" the elder Maynard said.
"I know he was off. I know he should have been in a hospital," the father said, adding that his son had previously been in an institution. He refused to elaborate, saying only that "the same problem was eating him again."
Crum had been in office just three months before he was killed Wednesday afternoon, making good on a campaign pledge to help rid the southern coalfields of the illegal prescription drug trade blamed for thousands of addictions and overdoses.