A Hamilton County judge on Tuesday set a trial date for the man accused of slaying his friend in 1981, then stuffing his body in a 55-gallon steel drum and pushing him out into Chickamauga Lake.
Billy Hawk, the owner of a bowling alley in Lebanon, Tenn., with ties to Chattanooga, will stand trial April 5. The 61-year-old was arrested Sept. 22 after a grand jury indicted him on charges of first-degree murder the same week. He remains in the Hamilton County Jail on a $500,000 bond.
Neal Pinkston, left, and Jimmy Logan speak to judge Don Poole about Logan's client, Billy Hawk, who was indicted on charges of first-degree murder by Hamilton County's grand jury.
Billy HawkBut Tuesday, he never appeared in Criminal Court before Judge Don Poole.
"There's nothing to be gained by stepping out in shackles and handcuffs," explained his attorney, Jim Logan. Logan assured reporters that, come April 5, "He'll be here, no question."
The hearing was delayed for an hour Tuesday morning, said district attorney general spokeswoman Melydia Clewell, adding that Hawk's refusal to come to court caused part of the delay.
Earlier Tuesday morning, Logan mentioned a gag order - which would have made the hearing unavailable to the public - but never filed it, Clewell said. Hawk did not want media attention, or anyone present during his hearing, Clewell said. Still, Poole agreed to do the status update without him.
After reappearing from a long recess around 10:30 a.m., Poole addressed the matter in open court: "There were some problems, I think, with the people incarcerated in jail and bringing those people over from jail." Then he set the trial date and a status conference for Nov. 30.
Matt Lea, spokesman for the Hamilton County Sheriff's Office, said the Corrections Division must enforce a judge's orders when it comes to prisoners. "If the judge requests to see an inmate, the HCSO does not have the authority to disobey said order," Lea wrote in an email.
In 1981, Hawk was the state's primary suspect in the death of Johnny Mack Salyer. But several younger witnesses prevented the state from linking Hawk to the homicide for more than 34 years, Pinkston said at a news conference in September.
On June 2, 1981, around 6:30 p.m., Maxine Greene and her husband, William, noticed a drum barrel bobbing in the water near the dock at their house on Rocky Point Road. William fished it out because his friend needed a burning barrel for barbecue, but quickly found it was riddled with holes and reeked of dead fish, according to news archives.
He pushed the barrel back into the slough and left for work the next morning. Maxine Greene, unable to tolerate the odor, called the Coast Guard, who called police. When police arrived, they found Salyer's body, stuffed bottom-first, inside.
Clad only in underwear, Salyer was so badly decomposed, he remained unidentified until his roommate and cousin ID'd him by a Rolling Stones tattoo on his right inner thigh. At the time, he and Hawk were co-defendants in a pending cocaine distribution case, Pinkston said.
Logan said Tuesday he has plowed through 1,000 pages of evidence and needs to review another 13 or 14 discs of information in preparation for the trial.
"The government has been working on this case for almost 35 years," Logan said. "There's a wealth of information from those investigations. You can well imagine it might take a country lawyer from Cleveland, Tenn., a few years" to go through the evidence, he said.
In the meantime, Hawk maintains his innocence, Logan said.
"There's an interesting development," he said. "We'd like to make bond, but there's more to be heard."
Asked to elaborate, Logan said he could not comment further.
Contact Zack Peterson at zpeterson@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6347. Follow @zackpeterson918.