RFP Staff
♦ No this was not an episode from “Beavis n’ Butthead”. Imagine how Garrett Loftin, 23, an Enerco sub-contractor inspecting Duke Energy power poles on the 100 block of Buccaneer Circle in Salisbury felt when he heard the back-to-back report of a shotgun and pellets striking nearby trees. His adrenalin pulsing, he looked around and saw two men standing on a mobile home porch at 185 Buccaneer Circle. One, later identified as Caleb Louden Spencer Heffner, 18, of 185 Buccaneer Circle, held a Mossberg shotgun.
The hardscrabble neighborhood made up of a jumble of kit and mobile homes with mud rutted lawns, now seemed strangely distant to the pole inspector as he hurried to his truck.
Loftin, in his truck, noticed Zachary Honeycutt walking up on him from the house. His face appeared serious. “Whatcha doin’ down here?”
“Just doing my job,” replied Loftin. “Why’d he shoot at me?” He eyed Heffner on the porch.
“That’s the way we do things around here,” said Honeycutt.
Loftin drove away. He called 911 dispatch and reported the incident and the two men.
When Rowan County Sheriff’s Office deputies showed up at Buccaneer Circle, they were met by a neighbor who allegedly witnessed Heffner firing his shotgun in Loftin’s direction.
Later Heffner and Honeycutt claimed they shot at a squirrel.
Records showed the shotgun was stolen.
Heffner was arrested and charged with assault with a deadly weapon (misdemeanor). Under $2,500 secured bond, he was placed in the Rowan County Detention Center. He was since released on bond.
Caleb Louden Heffner (below):
