Grand Jury seeks no charges against Cantrell



No charges will be filed in the shooting death of a Greenfield man after a decision was made by the Weakley County Grand Jury on Tuesday. On Aug. 13, Weakley County sheriff’s deputies responded to a physical domestic dispute at the home of Donnie and Lilly Cantrell on Will Young Road. A press release issued after the incident noted officers found Mr. Cantrell dead at the scene as a result of gunshot wounds. Mr. Cantrell was shot more than once with a 380-caliber pistol by his wife. WCSD investigators, the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation and the district attorney general’s office chose to present the case to the September term of the Weakley County Grand Jury. “We presented all of the evidence to the grand jury and they saw that it (the shooting) was justifiable,” 27th Judicial District Attorney General Tommy Thomas said on Wednesday. In other grand jury news, two Weakley County men have been indicted on felony charges of second-degree murder. Jason Kayser, 32, of Sidonia was indicted for the fatal beating of his wife, April. Kayser was arrested in April after he apparently drove his unconscious wife to the emergency room of a local hospital. Mrs. Kayser was airlifted to Vanderbilt Hospital in Nashville for life-threatening injuries. She passed six days later from blunt trauma injuries to the head. Mr. Kayser later admitted to investigators he had physically assaulted his wife 18 hours before she was taken to the hospital. He was initially charged with aggravated domestic assault. That charge was amended to second-degree murder after Mrs. Kayser’s death. Mr. Kayser remains jailed in the Weakley County Detention Center on a $100,000 bond. Thomas Randall Pruitt, 30, of Gleason also faces a count of second-degree murder in the shooting death of his father, James. Pruitt was arrested May 15. According to an affidavit, Pruitt’s father suffered a fatal gunshot wound to the forehead when he allegedly attempted to intervene during a domestic dispute between Pruitt and his mother. Pruitt is housed at the Weakley County Detention Center on a $100,000 bond. Both men are set to reappear in court on Sept. 8. WCP 9.04.08