A 24-year-old Coffee County, Tennessee, corrections officer is facing charges in neighboring Franklin County after he fired multiple shots from his back porch and met officers at his door smelling of alcohol and wearing a bulletproof vest.
A report filed Nov. 11 by Franklin County deputy Kason Bolin states that he, other deputies and Winchester police officers responded just before 10 p.m. to the area of Gary’s Market on Highway 130. City officers there said a resident told them a white pickup truck was seen leaving a home on Wilkerson Lane around the corner from the store.
Homes in the Wilkerson Lane area are separated by large yards but stand easily within hearing of gunshots.
When officers got to the house, Michael J. Merrill “answered the door and was wearing a black bullet-proof vest,” Bolin wrote in his report. “The odor of alcohol coming from his person was very strong.”
Merrill admitted to shooting a rifle into the air from his back porch,and to drinking two 40-ounce beers and “a few shots,” according to the report.