BY ROGER SMITH
MOUNTAIN CITIZEN
WARFIELD — The search of the Tug River from Warfield to the Ohio River for a missing Johnson County man was halted Thursday afternoon without any new leads.
Crews searched more than 64 miles of the Tug River starting Dec. 30 for David Blevins Jr., a Staffordsville resident described as 5-foot-11, 155 pounds and in his late 40s.
“We have covered ground from the Warfield boat ramp to where the Big Sandy empties into the Ohio River and have located nothing that indicates there is anything there for us to search further,” Martin County Sheriff’s Chief Deputy Chris Kidd said Thursday afternoon. “This exhausts all our search attempts in the river. We’ve had sonar, cadaver dogs, and multiple rescue boats on multiple days. We have not found anything.”
Thursday’s search included Ashland Fire Department’s sonar-capable boat scanning the waters from the Warfield boat ramp to the Low Water Bridge at the mouth of Calf Creek.
“They’re able to scan the bottom of the river for anything that might be under the water that we can’t see with the naked eye,” said Kidd. “They were unable to locate anything that stood out that would indicate that we should put any divers in the water.”
Ceredo Fire Department’s sonar-capable boat entered the waters at Virginia Point Park in Catlettsburg and searched the river toward Calf Creek.
On Thursday, Lawrence County Emergency Management also brought a boat for the Inez Fire Department to use in a visual search. Inez launched at the Warfield boat ramp and made it almost to the Louisa boat ramp.
Kidd reported Wednesday that cadaver dogs got a hit in one area, prompting officials to drag the river extensively at that location.
The search kicked off Dec. 30 with Kermit Fire Department’s Swift Water Rescue Team combing the waters. The sheriff’s office coordinated the extensive search effort.
In addition to Kermit’s persistent efforts, the sheriff’s office received assistance from Martin County Rescue Squad, Martin County 911 Mobile Command, Martin County Emergency Management, Lawrence County Emergency Management, Jessie and Penny Steffey and their cadaver dogs, Inez Fire Department, Williamson Fire Department, Ceredo Fire Department, Ashland Fire Department, Warfield Fire Department and Patriot EMS.
“We couldn’t do any of this without all of these people volunteering their time and their resources to help try to bring a resolution to this investigation,” said Kidd.
The investigation will continue, Kidd assured. Authorities urge anyone with information on Blevins’ whereabouts to contact the Martin County Sheriff’s Office at 606-298-2828.
Sheriff Kirk details attempted traffic stop
Blevins’ family members reported him missing in Johnson County on Dec. 19. According to Martin County Sheriff John Kirk, the family last spoke with Blevins on Dec. 12.
Sheriff Kirk said Blevins apparently fled from him Dec. 13 on Route 292.
Sitting in his office, he recounted the attempted traffic stop step by step, detailing the challenges he encountered and the decisions he made.
“We saw him on Long Branch. We were patrolling Long Branch and he was letting out a boy and a girl we did not know,” Kirk said, adding that the suspect exhibited suspicious behavior at that time. “The reason, I found out Sunday, was that he had two indictment warrants out of Johnson County, plus he did not have a driver’s license. That’s probably why he didn’t stop.”
The sheriff attempted to make a traffic stop after seeing the suspect run a stop sign and noticing taillights that were out. However, the suspect failed to stop during an approximate 10-mile distance along Route 292 from Lovely to Hode.
According to Kirk, the individual tossed something out the window near First Street just above R&J Building Supply.
“When we got down below Riverside where Dan Copley lived, he tossed a gun,” said Kirk. “If we had approached that truck earlier, we may have been killed there. You have to be careful what you do in the middle of the night when you don’t have any backup. You have to pick your battles.”
Kirk added in a matter-of-fact tone, “We don’t even know that he’s in the river.”
The sheriff attempted to cut the vehicle off when the suspect went around the Williams Branch Church at Hode.
“He avoided me, jumped across the ditch, went through people’s yards, and ultimately got in the backyard of Tom Dials on Jacob Lane,” Kirk said. “Tom doesn’t live there anymore; the house is empty.”
Constable Mitchell Bowen, who lives in the Hode area, saw a male bail out of the truck, jump a fence and run toward the riverbank.
“We didn’t go over to the river,” Sheriff Kirk said. “It was just me, Mitchell [Bowen] and one volunteer deputy. We weren’t going to go to the river in the darkness. That’s how police officers get killed.”
Kirk turned to technology to try to locate the suspect. He dispatched a drone and searched overnight into the following morning but found no sign of the suspect.
“From the time he got out of the truck and the drone got there, it was probably an hour, maybe even two hours,” remarked Kirk. “It takes a while. In that amount of time, he could have been way down the road. He could have traveled down the riverbank, came back up to the road and been gone. That is what we figured happened since there was no pressure on him. We didn’t go over the riverbank; we stayed there in the yard.”
The sheriff’s office then concentrated on the truck and tried to determine the owner.
“It came back registered to a lady in Blaine, but the registration said she lived in Prestonsburg. For the last two weeks we’ve been trying to track her down,” Kirk explained.
To gather more information, the sheriff returned to Long Branch with a volunteer deputy and two state police troopers to question those who might have been with the suspect.
“We went to a residence on Long Branch house and asked individuals who they were riding with,” said Kirk. “They said they didn’t know.”
As Kirk and his department worked to identify the suspect, a video from Zip Zone offered a key clue: tattoos on the driver’s knuckles.
“We called every jail—Big Sandy, Floyd County, Pike County—and asked if anyone recognized this guy by his tattoos. Nobody recognized him,” Kirk stated.
“We’ve been trying to track all this down but had no idea there was a missing person’s report filed on the 19th in Johnson County. Had we known, we would have started looking at the river then. We didn’t know about it until his daughter called our 911 dispatch on Sunday.”
Kirk’s frustration was apparent as he recalled the delay in connecting the dots.
“We had no idea who was driving that truck. As soon as we found it out, we went to work,” the sheriff said. “We sent the pictures that we got from Zip Zone to the family to confirm it was him. They had gotten him the clothes for his birthday and could identify his clothes.”
Kirk explained the decision-making process behind not searching the river immediately.
“If you don’t see someone go in the river, you don’t search the river,” he said. “We had no reason whatsoever to search the river. We had no idea he was missing.”
With limited resources the sheriff initiated the river search and got help from the various other agencies.
“I put myself in his father’s position,” said Kirk. “If my son were missing, I’d want to know where he was.”
Sheriff Kirk said his office appreciates all of the help and would continue doing everything possible to locate Blevins.