SWAT team apprehends suspect in Astor Court
By Ethan Smith
Published in News on April 19, 2016 1:46 PM
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News-Argus/CASEY MOZINGO
Members of the Wayne County Sheriff's Office SWAT Team escort the suspect in Monday morning's shooting out of an apartment on Astor Court Monday after several hours of attempting to get him to surrender. Several other local law enforcement agencies were on hand to provide assistance.
A Goldsboro man was arrested by the Wayne County Sheriff's Office just before 11 a.m. Monday in connection to a shooting at 664-B Durham Lake Road in Dudley that happened earlier that same morning.
Parker Jaylin Brown, 33, of 121 Astor Court, was arrested in the Astor Court apartment complex at the intersection of West Holly Street and Astor Court after the sheriff's office SWAT team executed a warrant for Brown's arrest for allegedly shooting Chad Christopher Craft, 41, in the head after 1 a.m. Monday.
"We received information this morning that he (Brown) was in this apartment," said Maj. Tom Effler with the Wayne County Sheriff's Office. "The SWAT team has been here since 8:45 a.m. this morning. He was asleep in the apartment when we arrived."
Effler said the SWAT team attempted to make contact with Brown three separate times before entering the apartment and arresting him.
Brown was arrested without incident once the SWAT team entered the Astor Court apartment and was placed under a $500,000 bond for attempted murder.
"He didn't want to come out," Effler said. "We called in the negotiators and attempted to make contact with him over the megaphone."
Debbie Higgins, who is Craft's landlord, was on the scene Monday morning as Brown was arrested.
Ms. Higgins said Brown, who goes by the street name "Tripp," was a longtime friend of Craft's, and she could not understand why Brown would have shot Craft, though she said she suspected drugs may have been involved.
"His (Craft's) girlfriend (Brittany Lee Brown) called me at 1:15 a.m. this morning and told me that Chad (Craft) had been shot in the head," Ms. Higgins said. "This isn't him. I don't know what happened. She (Ms. Brown) told me they were in bed when he (Brown) came into the room. Chad set up on the edge of the bed and Tripp (Brown) was quoting lyrics and saying all kinds of things. She said he wasn't making sense. Then he (Brown) shot Chad in the head, and the bullet went across the front of his skull and went in one side and out the other, and she (Ms. Brown) dove into the bathroom and locked the door and hit the floor."
Ms. Higgins said Ms. Brown told her that Brown kept saying he thought Craft and Ms. Brown were setting him up, claiming it was too dark in the house and the couple was "setting him up."
Ms. Higgins had been in contact with Ms. Brown Monday morning as Craft entered surgery at Vidant Hospital in Greenville.
"They did what they could at Wayne Memorial Hospital and then air lifted him (to Greenville)," Ms. Higgins said.
"He got into the ICU (Intensive Care Unit) and lost his eyesight and then started having seizures. They took him into the operating room and now they said he only has a 25 percent chance of survival."
Craft's condition was unknown as of press time.