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Lost lives shake Grundy County

By: Ben Benton
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Brent Myers
Paul Green

GRUNDY COUNTY, Tenn. — Slain Grundy County Deputy Shane Tate should have been digging up ginseng today in the mountains with his great grandfather.

Paul Green, 84, said his great-grandson came to see him last weekend at his home in Beersheba Springs, a community outside Altamont, Tenn., where Deputy Tate grew up.

“I’m so heartbroken I can’t talk to you much,” Mr. Green said as he sat on his porch with his two sons, Parker and Marshall.

“When he wasn’t working on his job, me and him were in the mountains picking ginseng,” he said. “He was a No. 1 good boy.

“He said he’d come back Saturday,” Mr. Green said, steeling himself over his breaking voice. “He said, ‘I’m going to come back Saturday and we’re going to the woods.’

“But he didn’t get to come.”

Deputy Tate was shot to death Thursday while trying to arrest Kermit E. Bryson at a trailer on Monteagle Falls Road. Later that day, surrounded by police, Mr. Bryson shot himself in the head and died early Friday at Erlanger hospital.

His great-grandson always called him “Daddy,” Mr. Green said, because Deputy Tate spent a lot of time at his great-grandfather’s home as he grew up.

Deputy Tate’s great-uncle, Parker Green, said the husband and father of five, wanted to make a difference.

“He put his fear behind him when it comes to helping the people,” Parker Green said. “He wanted to do right and put all the fear away because doing right was the thing to do above anything to him.”

Altamont resident Terry Richardson, who on Friday was manning a yard sale at city hall, said Deputy Tate’s death was “just a tragedy.”

“He was a good kid,” Mr. Richardson said.

Altamont Mayor Jimmy Walker, who on Friday was lowering a flag to half-staff in a town cemetery, said people in his town “are all upset. They can’t believe what happened.”

But two families lost a loved one on Thursday.

Tina Bretz, 35, was the girlfriend of Kermit Bryson, 29, the man accused of killing the young deputy at her Monteagle Falls Road home, then taking his own life just a few miles away at the home of Ms. Bretz’s mother.

People should know that Mr. Bryson also was a father who left a family behind, Ms. Bretz said.

“He has a daughter and three stepkids,” she said Friday through tears. “I want people to know that he’s not the bad person he’s been made out to be in the media.

“A lot of people know him and they know how good-hearted he is,” she said.

Ms. Bretz said she was present about 3 a.m. Thursday when the deputy was killed and when Mr. Bryson took his own life later that night. At the Winston Avenue home of her mother Thursday night, Mr. Bryson was frightened, she said.

“He just said he was scared and didn’t know what else to do,” she said. “He said he loved me and that he loved the kids ... and he was sorry.”

Ms. Bretz said she was sorry for the Tate family and shares their grief.

Grundy County Sheriff Brent Myers said he’d been unable to talk much about the incident until Friday.

Staff Photo by Ben Benton -- A day after Grundy County Deputy Shane Tate was gunned down while serving a warrant in Monteagle, his family grieves their loss. Great-grandfather Paul Green, from right, and great uncles Marshall Green and Parker Green talk about their loss and share memories.

“This has torn this department all to pieces,” Sheriff Myers said. “It’s not just me, it’s just devastated this entire department as well as other departments across the state.”

The sheriff said it will “take forever” for the impact of the slaying to lessen.

“We’ve all worked hard to try to move on,” the sheriff said, his eyes red-rimmed and swollen Friday morning. “You just can’t do it. You can’t even show up here on this doorstep without sitting down on the steps crying.

“Two families are also torn all to pieces, you know,” he said. “There’s nobody that wins in these situations. And everybody suffers.”

The sheriff said he worked with Deputy Tate and other officers earlier Thursday morning, before the deputy tried to serve a warrant on Mr. Bryson for violation of probation on a felony marijuana conviction.

“We were laughing and carrying on with each other,” the sheriff recalled. “There were about four of us that were out till about 2 o’clock that morning. Then we went home, and Deputy Tate went to this residence about five minutes till three.”

The sheriff said three officers — Deputy Tate, a reserve deputy and a Monteagle police officer — parked a short distance away from the mobile home because they knew Mr. Bryson had a history of fleeing police. As Deputy Tate approached the door, the other officers slipped around the trailer to cover the back door, the sheriff said.

Ms. Bretz answered the door and allowed Deputy Tate to come inside. Sheriff Myers said Mr. Bryson was sleeping on a mattress on the floor near the front door and stood up when the deputy told him he was under arrest.

Mr. Bryson asked if he could get dressed and headed for a back bedroom in the mobile home, with Deputy Tate following a few moments later, Sheriff Myers said.

“While he (Mr. Bryson) was putting his clothes on, shortly after that, was when some type of altercation happened,” the sheriff said. “We are unsure on the facts of what happened inside that bedroom. It’s probably going to take weeks before we find out exactly what did happen.”

The sheriff said he wished he’d stayed out with Deputy Tate on Thursday morning.

“I don’t know if I could have changed what happened,” he said. “Maybe I could’ve done something.”

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