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What happened inside a single-wide mobile home at 3483 Williams Creek Road on November 28, 2003? If evidence presented at last week’s trial in federal court — which was being decided by an eight-person jury as of the Independent Herald’s press deadline — it depends in large part on who is asked.

There were eight people present in or around the home when Sheriff’s Department Sgt. Hubert D. “John John” Yancey was shot and killed by his partner, Marty Carson, in an incident that has been defined accidental by investigators from the local and state levels but which attorneys for Sgt. Yancey’s family are attempting to prove intentional. Last week, jurors heard from six of those people. And, for the most part, there were a variety of versions from which to choose.

The question of what happened inside the mobile home is central to the wrongful death lawsuit filed by Yancey’s widow, Lori Yancey, and around which all other testimony that has grabbed headlines in area news media over the past 10 days revolve.

The only undisputed events of that day after Thanksgiving four years ago are that Sheriff’s Department Drug Agent Marty Carson, K-9 Officer John John Yancey, Sgt. Donnie Phillips and Deputy Carl Newport descended on the residence as part of an investigation into suspected methamphetamine cooking activity. When they arrived, they found Ryan Clark, his girlfriend Nichole Windle, Mark Rector, and his girlfriend Penny Carpenter. And the suspected methamphetamine lab. And, just minutes later, Sgt. Yancey was shot and killed as the result of friendly fire.

But the plaintiffs argued that there was nothing friendly about the fatal shot, which came from Officer Carson’s weapon. They argue that Carson murdered his partner to silence an investigation into his alleged drug trafficking activities. They had the backing, for the most part, of each of the four occupants of the mobile home, and — they argued — some of the circumstances themselves.

The defense argued that the fatal shooting was nothing more than a tragic accident in the heat of an intensely frightening moment, fired by an officer who was terrified and literally backed into a corner. They had the backing of the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation and the District Attorney General’s office, which declared the shooting an accident.

The events that played out at shortly after 8 p.m. on November 28, 2003, were actually put into motion the day before, Thanksgiving Day.

Carson testified last week that Yancey called him while he was eating Thanksgiving dinner at his sister’s home, asking him to “go 10-8” for an important matter. Later, he said, he would learn that Yancey had been told by a confidential informant that a man was delivering materials to manufacture methamphetamine to a Williams Creek Road residence, and might possibly be stopping by a Cherry Fork Road residence along the way.

Armed with a description of the vehicle, a rough description of the suspect, and a first name — Mark — Yancey and Carson positioned themselves along the most likely route of travel, Carson at what was then a Subway restaurant near the Scott County Food Court at Cherry Fork Road’s intersection with U.S. 27, and Yancey at Grand Vista Hotel near Baker Highway’s intersection with U.S. 27.

After a wait of approximately two hours without sighting the vehicle, Carson said, the officers decided to call it a night.

The following morning, Carson testified, he received a call from an Oneida police officer with information that Ryan Clark had purchased meth-making materials from a business in Oneida. The officers knew from Yancey’s informant, Carson said, that “Mark” was staying with Clark at Clark’s Williams Creek Road residence.

Armed with the new information, Carson said, he attempted to contact Yancey at his residence, but Yancey was not home.

Lori Yancey’s testimony also indicated that Carson had called with information about a case that the two officers had been working the night before. Her husband, she said, had taken their sons for a haircut and was not home to receive the call.

Both Carson and Yancey began their shifts that Friday afternoon at 2 p.m. According to Assistant District Attorney Sarah Davis, who at that time was the assistant D.A. in charge of Scott County, they continued work that afternoon on a child sex abuse case that they had been working, along with Sgt. Phillips, the day before Thanksgiving.

Carson said that he and Yancey also spent the afternoon making “several phone calls” in an effort to collect information on the man they knew only as Mark. Those phone calls turned up no information.

As the evening sat in, Carson said, the officers decided to stop at the Food Court for a cup of coffee. He said that they asked Sgt. Phillips, who was working with Deputy Newport that evening, to meet them at the store.

Phillips testified that while Carson and Newport were inside the store, Yancey used a laptop computer to search the Sheriff’s Department’s database for residents of Williams Creek Road who had been charged with crimes. The database returned a name: Mark New, who had been charged with what Phillips described to be “very minor crimes.”

The database included a photograph. Using the description provided by Yancey’s informant, Carson said, the officers immediately ruled him out as their suspect.

While it was not specifically alleged during last week’s proceedings in federal courtroom 3C at the Howard H. Baker, Jr. Federal Courthouse in downtown Knoxville, it had earlier been alleged that Mark New was set up to be a “fall guy.” Indeed, as the events of that evening transpired, officers from multiple jurisdictions, including the Tennessee Highway Patrol, would launch a manhunt for Mark New. New’s ex-wife, Paula Blankenship, testified at last week’s trial that family members contacted her throughout the night with information that her husband’s name was being mentioned in radio traffic as officers relayed information back and forth.

What was not testified to by any witness for either side was how Mark New’s name became associated with the shooting that evening. Because the officers ran a criminal history on New, however, dispatchers at the Sheriff’s Department would have had his name. It was left unsaid by the defense that as confusion ensued in the aftermath of the call of “Officer Down,” the name Mark New was a logical fallback since the officers had run a criminal history earlier in the evening.

Still armed with only the name “Mark” and knowledge of the Clark residence on Williams Creek Road, Yancey suggested the officers drive to the residence to do a “knock and talk,” both Carson and Phillips testified. Both said that they did not want to make the trip, but Yancey insisted.

“I told him that it was late, cold, and if there was a meth lab there, it would tie us up all night,” Carson said.

“I didn’t really want to go, but out of respect to John John I said yes,” Phillips added.

Yancey and Carson had just finished clandestine methamphetamine lab certification school, making them eligible for overtime pay under a federally-funded program if they worked extra hours on a methamphetamine investigation. Carson testified that this fact played a role in Yancey wanting to check out the residence right away rather than wait until the following day.

As the officers traveled to Williams Creek, Carson said that he asked Yancey if he was wearing his bullet-proof vest, to which Yancey responded that he was not. Carson said that he offered to stop by his residence to retrieve an extra vest, but Yancey declined. The issue of a vest would prove crucial, as Yancey was shot through the left shoulder, an area not protected by a vest. Plaintiff’s attorney Herbert Moncier suggested that, as a law enforcement officer, Carson would know where to shoot in order to miss the vest, while defense attorney John Duffy implied that if someone wished to shoot at close range and miss a vest, they would shoot for the head.

Sheriff’s Department Chief Detective Robby Carson would say at a press conference five days later that Yancey was wearing a bullet-proof vest.

As officers descended on the mobile home, Marty Carson testified, Yancey met Clark emerging from the rear of the residence.

Clark testified that he walked around the side of his residence to see four officers standing in the drive. He said that he talked to Yancey “for about 10 minutes,” and did not give officers consent to search his residence, but told Carson he could go to the door to ask if Mark Rector was in the residence.

Carson testified that he went to the back door of the residence and knocked, and was let into the residence by Windle.

Windle testified that Carson wanted to come in and talk, and that as she let him in, he noticed light from the trailer’s rear bedroom and wanted to know who was in the room, to which Windle testified that she responded, “No one . . . I knew Mark was wanted,” she said.

Carson started yelling for everyone in the rear room to come out, Windle testified. Windle then sat down in the floor and started crying, Carson said.

Lighting in the residence is a matter of dispute. Windle said that the bathroom light was on, but the hallway light was not on. Carson said that the hallway light was on, but the bathroom was “pitch dark.”

As Carson ordered the occupants of the rear room, which would turn out to be Rector and Carpenter, to come out, he said that Carpenter yelled “He’s got a gun. He’s going to kill you. He’s going to kill us all.”

In the bedroom, Carpenter and Rector both said in their depositions — which were read to jurors in place of live testimony by the two — that they had been asleep and had awoken upon hearing Carson in the kitchen of the residence, and were struggling to get dressed in the dark.

“We had been up (on meth) for several days and had finally started coming down and I had gone to sleep,” Rector said.

At about the time Carson said Carpenter started screaming about a gun, Rector testified that Carpenter screamed “I can’t go back to jail; I’d just as soon die as go back to jail.”

Windle, meanwhile, testified in her video deposition, which was played for jurors in absence of her live testimony, that Rector was screaming that he was going to kill Carpenter.

As Carson made his way down the hallway towards the back bedroom, he said, he yelled to his fellow officers and said “Don’t come in. He’s got a gun.” Phillips also testified that Carson said “Don’t come in. He’s got a gun.” That night, he said, he was unable to remember what Carson had said, and told TBI Special Agent Steve Vinsant as much. A few days later, he said, he remembered what Carson had yelled. Windle said that Carson yelled “John John, he’s in here.” Clark said that Carson yelled “John, we’ve got ‘em.” In his deposition, however, Clark had said that he “didn’t really know” what Carson had yelled from inside the mobile home.

Regardless, as Carson yelled, Yancey ran towards the home, testimony showed.

As Carson advanced on the doorway at the end of the hall, he testified, it swung open two-thirds of the way, and he could see what appeared to be a figure holding a shotgun.

As testimony continued, much was made about lights from a patrol car shining through a window. District Attorney General Wm. Paul Phillips said at a press conference on December 3, 2003, that Carson was blinded by lights from his patrol car shining through the bedroom window. Carson did not testify in that regard last week. Moncier produced photos taken by TBI agents showing a large tree outside the window and said that lights could not have shone through the window. Carpenter testified that lights shone through the window but that they “weren’t bright.”

Rector, Carpenter and Windle testified that the door did not open.

As the door swung open, Carson testified, he ducked into a bathroom off the left side of the hallway. Moments later, he said he saw what appeared to be approximately six inches of a shotgun barrel, and fired his gun.

“I was really scared. I saw what appeared to be a shotgun barrel coming into the doorway, and I assume right then that I’m about to be overtaken by a suspect,” Carson said.

Meanwhile, Carpenter and Rector testified that they heard the voices of two officers outside the door ordering them to come out before the shot was fired. Windle testified that Carson and Yancey had gone down the hallway together — “If [Carson] had turned, he would’ve hit [Yancey],” she said. She would also say at one point, as well as in statements given at other times, that she thought there might be three officers inside the home before the shot was fired.

Carson testified that after he fired his weapon, everything went quiet, and he then heard Yancey yell “I’m shot, please help.”

Clark testified that as he heard the shot, he bolted to the woods behind the mobile home, and lay in waist-deep water in the freezing temperatures throughout the night as he watched and listened to officers search for him. At one point, he said, he heard an officer say that if Clark was spotted, to shoot and “they’d check at daylight.”

Rector testified that he had been about to open the door when he heard the shot. Both he and Carpenter testified that they heard an officer say “shoot to kill” in the aftermath of the shooting, causing them to fear for their lives and flee for the woods through the back door minutes later.

Carson testified that he went into the hallway and saw Yancey lying on the floor, wounded. He said that he attempted to drag him from the home, but could not. He said he yelled for the officers outside to take cover, and ran for the door, believing Yancey was already dead. Outside, he said, he grabbed Newport and sought cover behind trees. Phillips said that he returned to his patrol unit to call for backup and an ambulance.

Windle testified that Carson was “pretty much in a state of shock” as he went out. She said that she paced the floors for a few moments, and returned to Yancey’s side.

“I was screaming out the door saying, ‘Please help. Your friend is dying in here.’ I held his hand and said ‘Please don’t die.’ He squeezed my hand . . . I watched his heart stop beating.”

Outside the mobile home, Carson said that he grabbed a shotgun from Phillips’ patrol car. “I was going back in to get John John,” he said. However, he added, Phillips told him that backup would arrive shortly and he should wait.

Seconds later, officers Jeremy Cross and Chuck Duncan arrived. Cross testified that he saw Carson standing at the corner of the mobile home with a shotgun. He and Carson then went inside the residence and “cleared it,” but Cross testified that he did not go into the back bedroom. He testified that he did not know whether Carson went inside the back bedroom. Cross would also dispute Carson’s description of the lighting inside the home.

Cross and Carson attempted CPR on Yancey until paramedics arrived minutes later. As Cross was still inside the home but Carson had left, Windle was allowed back inside the residence to use the bathroom. While in the bathroom, she testified, she saw a handgun lying behind the commode, with the butt and barrel resting on the floor and leaning against a water line. That handgun would turn out to be Yancey’s service weapon.

Within minutes after paramedics arrived, Yancey was transported to Scott County Hospital ER, where efforts to revive him were unsuccessful.

Lori Yancey testified that she was at her mother’s house when her brother called to say that an officer had been shot. She testified that as she listened to radio traffic, she learned that the officer was a 35-year-old male, and that it “wasn’t good,” because paramedics had radioed that he had “flat-lined.” Her worst fears were confirmed when she called Scott County Hospital ER, where she was employed, and was told by a personnel member that she needed to come in.

After staying by her husband’s side until she was ordered to leave, Yancey said that she encountered Marty Carson in a supply closet. She asked him who shot her husband, and said that he told her “Mark New.” She testified that she would not learn more until the following day, when Sgt. Phillips, Deputy Chris Yancey and eputy Ancil Chambers arrived at her home to tell her that “the bullet had come from Marty Carson’s gun that killed John John.”

Carson contended that he did not realize that it was his shot that had killed his partner until later. He did not hear another shot, and did not see a muzzle flash from another gun, he said. But, he added, “I was so terrified I didn’t know what was going on. There could’ve been three or four other shots and I wouldn’t have known. I had 15 million other things going through my mind. I had in my mind that I wanted to go home just like everybody else.”

Detective Randy Lewallen testified that after talking with Carson and Sheriff Jim Carson and taking a walk through the mobile home to check for bullet holes, he concluded within a half hour after the shooting occurred that Marty Carson had likely killed his partner.

Moncier’s major point of contention with Carson during cross-examination was Carson’s claim that it was pitch dark inside the bathroom despite the hallway light being on. He also questioned how Yancey’s weapon could have gotten from the hallway into the bathroom and behind the commode.

TBI Special Agent Steve Vinsant testified that while his investigation had been thorough and one that he was confident in, he remained troubled about certain aspects, such as the bullet’s left-to-right trajectory, which would have been opposite what it should have been if both Carson and Yancey were positioned where they were believed to be, and the fact that Carson turned his back on the perceived danger in the bedroom when assisting his partner.

To that point, Carson said, “To be honest, I was so scared I didn’t think about it.”

Both Windle and Clark testified that they had heard scuffling before the shot was fired — Windle would say that she thought “they were dragging Mark out of there, but the bedroom door never opened” — suggesting that there was a scuffle between Carson and Yancey. Vinsant testified that his investigation revealed that the gun was at least two feet or more away from Yancey at the time the shot was fired.

Carson said that he understood Lori Yancey’s anger with him.

“I know Lori’s still mad,” he said. “I understand that. I do not blame her.”

While the jury was to have ultimately determined whether the events of November 28, 2003, were the result of a tragic accident or the planned actions of a desperate officer, those testifying left little doubt that Yancey died doing what he felt he was called to do.

“The only thing [John John] wanted to do was be a police officer,” his mother, Judith Gordon, testified. “I wanted him to be an attorney, but he said ‘No, mom, there’s too much stuff out there.’”

“His goal was to do the right thing,” Lori Yancey added.

“[John John] liked his work. He liked what he was doing,” Sgt. Phillips said. He admitted that the death of Sgt. Yancey, who he called a friend, was difficult to talk about.

“Somebody you were around every day and talked to and one day they’re not around anymore . . . it’s tough,” he said.