HOT SPRINGS -- A Mountain Pine man who was arrested on manslaughter charges Sunday afternoon after a tractor he was driving struck and killed his 4-year-old grandson said he had been drinking beer at the time, according to an affidavit released Monday.
Stevie Donel Neighbors, 53, was taken into custody shortly after 4:30 p.m. Sunday on the felony charge, punishable by up to 10 years in prison, and later released on $3,500 bond. He is scheduled to appear July 25 in Garland County District Court.
According to the affidavit, Garland County sheriff's deputies were called to a residence at 1940 Three Sisters Road about a possible fatality involving a child and a rotary mower.
When deputies arrived they learned a 4-year-old boy had been riding on a tractor while the operator, Neighbors, was mowing a field. The tractor ran into a hole that caused the child to fall off the tractor, and the child was run over and killed before the tractor was stopped, the affidavit said.
The affidavit noted that Neighbors picked up the child, "knowing he was dead," and carried him to the house.
There was an indication that Neighbors had been drinking when the accident happened, according to the affidavit. Neighbors agreed to take to a portable breathalyzer test and registered a blood alcohol content of 0.059 percent, below the legal driving limit of 0.08 percent, according to the affidavit.
Investigators spoke with Neighbors, who they said admitted to drinking three or four beers while mowing that day. Neighbors voluntarily went to CHI St. Vincent Hot Springs for a blood test and was taken in for questioning.
After waiving his rights, Neighbors again admitted to police that he drank three or four beers that morning while mowing and admitted to smoking two marijuana cigarettes Friday night, the affidavit said.
The affidavit said there was a second child, an 8-year-old girl, riding on the tractor at the time. She told police that she had been standing on the tractor and the 4-year-old was standing on the other side of Neighbors just before the boy died.
The girl said she saw a hole in the ground and tried to tell Neighbors, but she said she didn't think Neighbors heard her because of the noise from the tractor, according to the affidavit. When the tractor hit the hole, there was a "violent jerk" and both children fell. The girl said she caught herself by grabbing the steering wheel to slow her fall.
Neighbors told investigators that he was driving the tractor in fourth gear, low range, at full throttle, and estimated his speed at 4 to 5 mph at the time of the boy's death.
State Desk on 07/12/2016