A trial date has been set in 2027 for a federal wrongful death suit filed against Grundy County, Tennessee, and six members of the county Sheriff’s Office, according to documents in U.S. District Court in Chattanooga.
The suit was filed in 2025 by 53-year-old Ronnie Glenn Ledbetter’s adult children, Amber Baltimore, Taylor Ledbetter and Cody Ainsworth, and seek unspecified damages over alleged violations of Ledbetter’s constitutional rights under the Fourth and 14th amendments, protecting him from the excessive force the suit alleges led to Ledbetter’s death.
The suit, filed by Lewisburg, Tennessee, attorneys David J. McKenzie, Debbie Z. Boudreaux and Savannah B. Oliver on the family’s behalf, names the county, Grundy County Sheriff’s Office Deputies Justin Graham, Jayven Bess, Kenneth Nunley, Brandon King and David Young, and Corrections Officer Joshua Turner as defendants.
The original suit filed in June 2025 also named Sheriff Heath Gunter, but the most recent suit documents no longer name him. The defendants are represented by Chattanooga attorneys B. Thomas Hickey Jr. and W. Adam Izell.