UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
Monday, October 23, 1995
7A
Authorities search for Chad Beers again
The Associated Press
DUTCH MILLS, Ark. — A man who escaped from federal custody eluded aircraft, bloodhounds and dozens of law officers for a second day yesterday in the woods of northwestern Arkansas.
Local, state and federal authorities continued a massive manhunt for Chad Allan Beers, who scaled a wire fence early Saturday and fled the Washington County Jail in Fayetteville, Ark., where he was being held for U.S. marshals.
Authorities in planes and helicopters conducted infrared sweeps of a heavily wooded area where the fugitive was believed to be hiding but found no sign of Beers following his second jailbreak in two years.
"The search is still under way; it remains as it was," Sheriff's Deputy Ed Godden said yesterday. "It has not stopped."
Law officers set up a command post at the junction of Arkansas 59 and County Road 15, about three miles north of Dutch Mills, Ark., near the Oklahoma border where Beers fed on foot after wrecking a car he stole Saturday in his getaway.
Arkansas State Police representative Wayne Jordan said that more than 100 officers, from federal agencies as well as local and state agencies in Oklahoma and Arkansas, were involved in the search yesterday. He said that the area being searched was about 6 miles wide, and about 10 miles long.
Jordan said that authorities planned to continue the search until at least this afternoon, when a reevaluation of the case was planned.
Beers, 25, was being held in the Washington County Jail awaiting a federal trial at Fort Smith, Ark., on escape charges stemming from his 1994 escape from the Sebastian County Jail. He was recaptured a week later in Nebraska.
A representative for the U.S. Marshal Service said that Beers had been picked up by federal authorities at a jail at Lincoln, Neb., where he was being held after a conviction on state charges stemming from a robbery that preceded his recapture last year.
Beers escaped Saturday by climbing a wire fence surrounding the yard at the Washington County Jail, Jordan said. Beers attacked an
elderly woman, stole money from her and took her car, which he later wrecked, Jordan said.
Authorities used aircraft from the U.S. Marshal Service, FBI, Arkansas state police, Arkansas Air National Guard and Benton County sheriff's office in the search.
Beers is 6 feet tall with shoulder-length brown hair. He was last seen wearing jeans and a white T-shirt, authorities said.
A Washington County sheriff's dispatcher said police from Lincoln, Ark.; Farmington; Prairie Grove; and Adair County, Okla., had joined the search. The canine squad from the Fayetteville Police Department and bloodhounds from the State Correction Department also participated.
When Beers escaped from the Sebastian County Jail Aug. 30, 1994, he was serving a term of 14 to 20 years for kidnapping a 79-year-old Clarksville, Ark., man in September 1993. He was scheduled for transfer to a federal prison in El Reno, Okla.
He was recaptured Sept. 7, 1994, after a pickup truck he was driving collided with a University of Nebraska van in Lincoln, Neb., authorities said.
Blind Melon singer Hoon found dead in tour bus
The Associated Press
NEW ORLEANS — Shannon Hoon, whose smooth, high-pitched vocals took the rock group Blind Melon to the top of the charts with its eclectic 1993 debut hit "No Rain," died Saturday. He was 28.
Hoon was found dead on his tour bus about 1:30 p.m. His sound manager couldn't wake him and called police, Sgt. Marlon DeFillo said. DeFillo said that there was no sign of trauma and that the cause of death remained unclassified until an autopsy could be completed.
The coroner's office in New Orleans received receipt of Hoon's body but would not comment. A security guard at Capitol Records, the band's label in Los Angeles, said no one was available to comment.
Hoon — born Richard Shannon Hoon in Lafayette, Ind. — experienced both personal and professional turmoil as his band gained fame.
Blind Melon was in New Orleans to play at the famed Tipitina's music club. The tour bus was in a parking lot on St. Charles Avenue, near where the group recorded its second album, "Soup," in the city's Warehouse District.
In October 1993, Hoon faced nudity and indecent exposure charges after he stripped and urinated onstage in a concert in Vancouver, British Columbia. He also was charged for attacking a security guard while taping the American Music Awards in February 1994.
Blind Melon's appearance at Woodstock '94 brought mixed reviews, and Hoon was arrested for drunken and disorderly conduct in New Orleans while recording "Soup."
In an interview last month with The Associated Press, Hoon said he began going through a period of intense self-evaluation after learning that his girlfriend, Lisa, was pregnant.
"I need to start caring about myself if I'm going to be the proper father," Hoon said.
Hoon told The Indianapolis Star last month that he had straightened himself out and wanted to get a motor home to tour with his girlfriend Lisa and their daughter, Nika Blue. The three lived together in Lafayette, Ind. He would not give his girlfriend's last name.
Hoon came from the same hometown as Axl Rose of the group Guns N' Roses, which toured with the Melons and helped the group early
on. Hoon sang backing vocals on the Guns' song "Don't Cry," and his appearance as a man in plaid in the video helped create a buzz for the Melons.
When the group's first album was released in September 1992, sales remained stagnant until MTV began airing the "No Rain" video nine months later. The video, which featured a 10-year-old actress cavorting in a bee costume to Hoon's vocals, became the group's signature.
Soon after, the album was selling more than 100,000 a week and hit No.3 on the Billboard album chart The group was nominated for Grammy awards in 1994 for new artist and best rock performance but did not win.
The follow-up release, "Soup," is a spicy mix of hard-aged guitar, jazzlike improvisation and erratic rhythms. The single, "Galaxie," peaked Aug. 25 at No. 8 on Billboard's modern rock chart.
The band's name came from Mississippi neighbors of bassist Brad Smith: unemployed hippies who called each other "blind melons." The other band members are guitarists Christopher Thorn and Rogers Stevens and drummer Glen Graham.
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