Sheriff: Carter Co. man charged with murder after missing man found dead in freezer

Jeff Keeling
·3 min read
9

ELIZABETHTON, Tenn. (WJHL) — A Carter County man faces a first-degree murder charge for allegedly killing another man sometime around early February and then allegedly moving and hiding his body, which was found Wednesday inside a buried freezer in a remote area of Hampton.

Photo: The remains of Edward Elliot, 64, are believed to have been found after he was reported missing in March and last heard from in either late January or early February. (Courtesy of the CCSO)
Photo: The remains of Edward Elliot, 64, are believed to have been found after he was reported missing in March and last heard from in either late January or early February. (Courtesy of the CCSO)

Joey Guinn, 46, is charged with murder, abuse of a corpse and tampering with evidence after being arrested Wednesday in the death of Edward Elliott, 64, whose body search teams discovered off a remote road in Hampton Wednesday. His arrest follows an investigation and interviews that began in early April.

An affidavit for Guinn’s arrest states that friends and family of Elliott began reporting him missing on March 31, but told the Elizabethton Police and Carter County Sheriff’s Office in separate reports they hadn’t communicated with him since late January.

Various interviews by Carter County Sheriff’s investigators led them to quickly interview Guinn after one tip put Elliott at Guinn’s home at 125 Mike Clawson Road in Hampton.

Guinn told officers Elliott had been at his house for a day or two a couple of months prior, then told them he believed Elliott was with a couple that included Elliott’s daughter.

The affidavit said officers got an anonymous tip in mid-April that Elliott was violently beaten outside Guinn’s house by Guinn and another man and that two people witnessed the beating. Officers interviewed a couple on April 22, both of whom reported having witnessed a violent fight involving Elliott, Guinn and a third man. One witness said the incident occurred at the end of January or first of February, the other said early to mid-February.

One witness described seeing “Guinn and (the other man) violently kicking Mr. Elliott, while Elliott pleaded with the two.”

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Both described seeing a pool of blood the next morning where the fight had occurred, and both also reported that Guinn left in a truck that contained a “job box” container in the back for tools and later returned with the truck, but without the box.

Wednesday, the affidavit says, investigators from the Carter County Sheriff’s Office, Tennessee Bureau of Investigation and Elizabethton Police Department searched Guinn’s Mike Clawson road property as well as two addresses on nearby Stout Hollow Road. A cadaver dog “positively indicated” an odor consistent with human decay, after which investigators deployed a metal detector that showed something under the soil.

Agents recovered a large freezer, opened it with a death investigator from the William L. Jenkins Forensic Center present, and found human remains “believed to be Edward Elliott.”

As of Thursday, Guinn was being held in the Carter County Detention Center. He was arraigned Thursday afternoon and placed on a $5 million bond.

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