Three people will split a cash reward for their role in helping police find the suspects in two Kanawha County shooting deaths earlier this year.
The Kanawha County Commission on Thursday agreed to give a $10,000 reward to three people who gave information to law enforcement that led to the arrest of Bobby Hall and Misty Rucker, who are charged in the February deaths of Timothy Jett and Audrey Short at Jett's Garrison Avenue home, in Charleston.
Jett died at the scene and Short died of her injuries later. Hall, of Elkview, and Rucker, of Sissonville, were later arrested in the Queen Shoals area near Clendenin after a police pursuit.
Rucker was charged with murder and conspiracy. Hall was charged with first-degree murder.
Hall had allegedly told people that he would kill as many police officers as he could, Maryclaire Akers, an assistant Kanawha County prosecutor, said Thursday. Akers said that after the commission agreed to offer a reward for information, tips about Hall came pouring in to police.
Ultimately, three people will split the $10,000 reward. A Kentucky man gave police a description of the vehicle Hall allegedly stole from him earlier. Two women were able to tell police what direction Hall and Rucker were heading in.
"Hall was ... a person that law enforcement deemed a significant risk to them and other law enforcement that he might encounter," Akers said. "All three of these individuals did a really good job helping law enforcement find him quickly."
Akers said previously she's only worked on one other case in which a reward was offered - a series of sniper-style killings in 2003.
Also Thursday, the Kanawha County Commission agreed to give Yeager Airport $200,000 for various infrastructure projects.
Director Terry Sayre said the money will help the airport pay the remaining bills for cleanup and monitoring of the area affected by the March 2015 collapse of the airport's safety-overrun area.
"We just want to make sure it's stable and safe for the neighborhood and for the total area," Sayre said after speaking at the meeting. "I think it's in good shape and it's all overgrown with grass and weeds. It looks pretty good."
In other business, the commission:
n Agreed to move a sign marking the location of Institute on W.Va. 25. The sign is currently located near Lincoln Avenue (past Shawnee Regional Park). The sign will be relocated to the traditional beginning of the Institute area, just past 26th Street. The sign's location was brought up in one of many comments made about the Shawnee multi-sports complex, a project the county commission voted to move forward with, Commissioner Ben Salango said. The sign had been moved by the Division of Highways, Salango said.
n Agreed to submit the county's precinct maps to the state for approval, as required by state law. The county hired Harry McKenzie, a professional engineer, to update its precinct maps. Last year, problems led to several county residents voting in the wrong delegate district. Carper said Thursday he didn't want that to happen again.
"[McKenzie] went through and checked all of our precinct maps," Deputy County Manager Andrew Gunnoe said. "First he digitized the data and then he checked all the data to make sure all the data registration lists matched our precinct maps. If there were places were it didn't, he basically changed the maps so it would match."
n Russell Kruzelock, director of the West Virginia Regional Technology Park in South Charleston, said they are in negotiations with a new company to come to the park. The name of the company has not been released. Officials said the negotiations with the company are in the early stages and are not a "done deal."
Reach Lori Kersey at lori.kersey@wvgazettemail.com, 304-348-1240 or follow @LoriKerseyWV on Twitter.