The Associated Press
COAL HILL, Ark. (AP) _ A second man whom police had been looking for for two weeks in the shooting of a state trooper was taken into custody Saturday morning after he was spotted walking along a highway.
William J. Frazier, 28, was spotted by a Johnson County sheriff’s deputy on U.S. Highway 64 at Coal Hill and taken into custody without incident, according to the state police. Frazier was taken to the county jail in Clarksville.
“I don’t think he knew where he was going for sure,” said state police Sgt. Pete Westerman. “I think he’s pretty well wore out. Everybody else is.”
Authorities had been searching in the Ozark Mountains and rural communities for Frazier and Mark Holsombach, 49, since March 22, when officers tried to serve warrants on the men at their ramshackle cabin near Alread in Van Buren County.
It’s unclear how Frazier and Holsombach met, though investigators think they met in jail in Louisiana.
Authorities also wanted to question Frazier and Holsombach, who has relatives in Louisiana, about the disappearance of their neighbors, Ted and Ann Throneberry.
Instead, shots were fired and state police Cpl. Charlie Edmonson was wounded in one arm. Ten hours elapsed before authorities realized the two had gotten away and were no longer in the cabin. An attempted capital murder warrant was issued for Holsombach and Frazier and another warrant charged Frazier with felony possession of a firearm that has traveled in interstate commerce.
Friday afternoon, Holsombach and Ann Throneberry, 45, were picked up as they walked along a dirt road off Arkansas 7 near Pelsor in southern Newton County. They were taken to the county jail in Jasper, then moved to the Van Buren County jail Friday night.
Authorities say they now believe that Ann Throneberry was at the cabin when the trooper was shot and that she ran off with Holsombach and Frazier.
Van Buren County Sheriff Scott Bradley says investigators suspect Ted Throneberry is no longer alive. The search continued Saturday for him.
Throneberry, 46, was last seen in February when he left a pipefitting job in Illinois and headed for his home near Alread. His wife had been missing from their home since March 1.
Police said Holsombach and Frazier had been seen standing in the Throneberrys’ front yard and were the last people seen with Ann Throneberry before she disappeared.
Westerman said that before Frazier was picked up Saturday, the last confirmed sighting of him was in Clarksville. At one point, a Coal Hill police officer stopped Frazier but Frazier gave the officer another name and the officer let him go, Westerman said.
Both Holsombach and Ann Throneberry were in the Van Buren County jail in Clinton on Saturday. State police Sgt. Bill Beach said investigators questioned the two for four hours Friday night and detectives planned to talk with prosecutors Saturday about charges against Ann Throneberry.
Holsombach and Frazier had been living in the small, mountain community of about 100 people for three years with Holsombach’s wife, Jerry Partin. Partin bought the 35-acre tract where the couple lived.
Officials said Partin, who knows Ann Throneberry, has been staying at a women’s shelter in Clinton since before the March 22 shooting, when state police had tried to serve a bench warrant for Holsombach for possession of firearms, a Florida arrest warrant that included a theft charge against Frazier, and a search warrant for their cabin.