Fayetteville police say man shot himself; driver arrested

 Dedrick Roberts
Dedrick Roberts

FAYETTEVILLE -- Police arrested a man they said was driving erratically on Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard with a man who had been shot in his backseat.

Dedrick Earl Roberts, 21, of 19 Phillips County 226 just outside Helena, was arrested in connection with filing a false police report and endangering the welfare of a minor, according to a preliminary police report.

Police stopped Roberts about 4 p.m. Wednesday at the intersection of Government Avenue and MLK Boulevard.

Police found Adrian Wallace, 26, of Fayetteville with a gunshot wound in the white Dodge Charger.

Officers applied tourniquets to Wallace's legs, according to a preliminary police report released Thursday. Wallace was taken to Washington Regional Medical Center and transferred to another hospital, according to police.

Sgt. Anthony Murphy, police spokesman, said Thursday he didn't know Wallace's condition or which hospital he was in.

Roberts told police a passenger shot another passenger while both were in the backseat. A male teenager, who said he was in the front seat, told police Wallace shot himself with a sawed-off Mossberg 20-gauge shotgun with a pistol grip, according to the report. The gun was found in the car.

Roberts said he was driving when he "heard a loud noise over the music and saw a flash inside the car." Roberts told police one man said he was shot, and the other "suddenly fled from the back of the vehicle," according to the report.

Roberts told police he began driving fast through traffic to take the man to a hospital, the report shows. A police officer noted in the report Roberts had a cell phone but didn't call 911.

The boy told police three people were in the car and Wallace "somehow accidentally shot himself in the legs with the shotgun in the backseat," according to the preliminary report. Wallace told Roberts and the boy to say someone else shot him, according to the report.

Police used surveillance video they said supported the youth's story, according to the report.

The name of the juvenile wasn't released because state law prevents police from identifying him, Murphy said.

Roberts was at the Washington County Detention Center with bonds of $1,765 on Thursday. A hearing has been set for Friday, according to online jail records.

NW News on 08/04/2017

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