Fugitive caught with help of citizens’ persistence
MICHAEL CHRISTOPHER SIMONDS
He had been on the run since July 6, 2018, and the arrest took place in part because of a band of dedicated friends of the victim.
On the afternoon of Oct. 15, a Clinton resident called the Anderson County Sheriff’s Office saying he had spotted Simonds riding as a passenger in a truck on Raccoon Valley Road. He also called a female friend in Norris, who in turn called a number of other friends.
“We’ve spotted him,” the female friend told them.
They each drove to different places that Simonds, 38, had been seen in the past, waiting to snap a picture to send to the sheriff so his deputies would know where to look.
One of the victims’ close friends, Christina Eich, drove straight to the Norris Police Station.
“He’s just been seen,” she told the chief, asking if he or his officers could respond.
Chief Chip Kaine replied that it was not in his jurisdiction. Frustrated, Eich then drove to one of the last known locations herself.
She and another friend traced Simonds’ vehicle to Walmart, where they called Clinton Police. Two officers responded to that call and waited in front of Walmart, but after about 30 minutes, they left the scene when no one came back to the truck.
They all missed him.
The nightmare begins
It all started the night of July 6, when Simonds was allegedly helping out or hanging out at a business in Norris. According to the sheriff’s incident report, Simonds asked the victim, an employee at the business, for a ride home. The victim, 45, along with her young son, drove him home to a house on Norris Freeway.
The victim told The Courier News on Friday that she had known him for years.
“I knew he wasn’t the most trustworthy person, but he was never rude to me in any regards,” she said. “He never even said a cuss word around me. He always behaved like a gentleman.”
She had no reason to believe he had criminal intentions, she said.
“Once they arrived at Mr. Simond’s residence,” reads the Anderson County Sheriff Office’s incident report, “Mr. Simonds asked [the victim] to exit the vehicle and hold a flashlight for him so he could plug up a cable so he would have power inside of his RV.”
When she did as he asked, he attacked.
He pulled out a long, fixed blade knife with a wooden handle and held it to her throat, digging in hard enough to leave two long cuts, according to the incident report, which the reporting officer saw. Simonds then allegedly told her to remove all her clothing and then assaulted her. He attempted to smother her with a pillow, and then proceeded to choke her with his hands when she wouldn’t stop talking about his family and her own, she said.
The victim’s son then came looking for her, calling for his mother through the rain.
When he found them, Simonds allegedly jumped off the victim and ran out of the RV. Her son called 911. The mother and son jumped into their vehicle, frantically backing out of the dark driveway until they got stuck in the mud.
“I had lost my glasses,” the victim told The Courier News. “I was panicking and making sure that my son was in the car. I couldn’t see.”
The police and an ambulance arrived, but she didn’t take the ambulance because she said she was afraid she would have to leave her son. For days after, her chest was tight and her throat and neck were extremely sore due to the incident. She was in a lot of pain and even found it difficult to swallow.
Pursuing justice
More than 90 days have passed since the alleged incident, and, up until Thursday morning, Simonds was a wanted man.
But he was allegedly hiding in plain sight. According to Eich, Simonds had been seen multiple times around the surrounding area since July.
“This is a big mess that has been handled badly,” she said.
Eich took care of the victim’s son following the incident, and that night when the victim took herself to the hospital, believing she may have had a broken rib.
“I held that poor kid for hours that night as he cried, mumbled, had nightmares and felt immense guilt thinking he should have looked for his mom sooner,” she said. “He’s scarred for life.”
Eich —along with friends Lindsay Pirkle and Dana Barker — continued to dig and ask questions. They also made people aware of the situation out of fear that Simonds would come back and do the same thing to someone else. They grew increasingly frustrated as no arrest was made, and the victim grew more fearful every day that Simonds would come after her.
Barker alerted The Courier News to the alleged crime on Oct. 10, and a call was made to first-term District 2 Constable Shannon Gray. Gray expressed shock at the severity of the crimes and said he would do whatever he could to help find Simonds. He contacted newly elected Sheriff Russell Barker (no relation to Dana Barker).
Sheriff Barker, having just been elected into office, was floored at the allegations when he spoke to The Courier News and also expressed shock that he had not been found.
“This is damn horrible,” he said. “We’re gonna hunt this guy.”
Less than 24 hours later, Simonds was in custody.
Forming a posse
The stretch of time between the incident and the arrest could have happened for a number of reasons, according to Barker.
“I’m not sure what happened here,” he said to The Courier News on the Friday morning following the arrest.
According to Barker, the Aggressive Crime Enforcement unit, which is the unit that handles warrants, has been involved in shift-work lately.
“We have to pull them into shifts to get them into state-mandated training,” he said, which could take a while, “so that may have played a role.”
A new sheriff isn’t given a rundown of what cases haven’t resulted in arrests; a sheriff’s duties are more administrative, according to Barker. He said he doesn’t know why it took so long to make an arrest, but, when he was made aware of the alleged crimes, he “formed a posse.”
“We sent out between six and eight deputies,” he said.
ACSO Sgt. Robert Sexton was in charge of putting the group together. A patrol officer with a K9 was part of the arresting unit, and officers from the Norris Police Department helped strategize since he had been seen in various Norris locations like the Dollar General prior to the arrest, according to Sexton. They split up and did drive bys by two homes owned by Simond’s parents, and a home on Old Tacora Hills Road.
ACSO had received a tip the previous day that he was staying at a house on Old Tacora Hills Road, and the team that drove by that house saw him on the porch, according to Sexton.
According to the arrest report, Simonds was located at Old Tacora Hills Road at 11 a.m. Oct. 18. The 7th Judicial Task Force assisted with the arrest, and he was transported to the Anderson County Detention Facility without incident. He is being held on $177,000 bail and is scheduled for a hearing on Oct. 23.
Simonds has been arrested 19 times by ACSO since 2008 for crimes that include drug-related offenses, criminal impersonation and multiple contempt of court charges, according to the ACSO’s website.
“I am doing wonderful today,” the victim told The Courier News on Friday morning. “I had a wonderful night’s sleep.” Her son is doing well the day after Simond’s arrest as well.
“It’s like this huge weight is off of both of us,” she added.
Still, she deals with a lot of loss, not just in her faith in people, but in the loss of her community as she doesn’t want to return to the place it all happened.
“I loved everybody I worked with,” she said. “I loved everybody in that community. It was such a loss on so many levels.”
This case is an ongoing investigation. All facts reported are from police reports. When quoting the victim, the information was verified through police reports.