In this 2014 file photo, a poster with pictures of missing Tennessee nursing student Holly Bobo hangs on a fence in front of her house in Parsons, Tenn.DECATURVILLE, Tenn. — The Tennessee Bureau of Investigation resumed investigations Thursday in the five-county judicial district where the high-profile death of a 20-year-old nursing student is being prosecuted, a day after saying it was suspending activities there.
The TBI announced Wednesday it was suspending investigations in the 24th Judicial District as the result of a disagreement with District Attorney General Matt Stowe.
But Thursday night, the agency issued a release saying it was resuming work in the district and that Stowe has requested a special prosecutor to handle Holly Bobo's case.
"We are committed to our relationship with those local law enforcement agencies and hope to do what we can to provide the excellent investigative and forensic resources to which they're accustomed," TBI Director Mark Gwyn said in the release.
The TBI said Stowe asked the Tennessee District Attorneys General Conference to appoint a prosecutor to handle the Bobo case.
A message left at Stowe's office was not immediately returned Thursday evening.
Gwyn said Wednesday that Stowe alleged misconduct by the TBI and other law enforcement agencies.
Stowe denied he asked the TBI to suspend investigations in the district, which includes Benton, Carroll, Decatur, Hardin and Henry counties.
Gwyn said the dispute stems from Stowe attacking the work of the TBI and other agencies involved in the investigation into Bobo's disappearance and killing.
Meanwhile, at a Wednesday hearing in the Bobo case, a judge ordered prosecutors to start handing over evidence to defense attorneys of the two men charged with kidnapping and murder.
Gov. Bill Haslam told reporters in Nashville on Thursday that his administration had been involved in discussions to resolve the dispute between the TBI and the local prosecutor, and that "it's in everybody's interest to get that worked out."
"Obviously the DA's independently elected and the TBI is an agency of ours that we feel like has been real effective, and they should continue to do that," Haslam said.
"The right thing is always to make certain that the TBI is providing service everywhere they can to local law enforcement as well as (to) prosecutorial authority," he said.
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