Ashley Station crowd runs down man in black gown with torch and golf club, officer says
A black gown, a golf club, and a torch.
These are the things a Columbus man had early Thursday when he tracked his ex-girlfriend to Ashley Station apartments after breaking into her home on Sixth Avenue near 20th Street, police said.
Tyri Tolliver was in Recorder’s Court on Friday morning facing charges of aggravated stalking and first-degree burglary.
Officer Michael Bacon testified he was called at 11:35 p.m. Wednesday to the woman’s 40th Avenue home, where he heard screaming and saw a crowd of people in the street.
The woman told him Tolliver, for whom she’d got a restraining order after he was arrested May 18 for hitting her, had been texting and calling her repeatedly before he broke through her back door and chased her through her home as she escaped out the front door.
Tolliver, 23, had already left the area, so Bacon also left, to fill out a report. The woman had a friend drive her to Ashley Station, on Olive Street off Talbotton Road.
At 12:15 a.m. Thursday, Bacon got another call, this one reporting that Tolliver had tracked his ex-girlfriend to Ashley Station, where he was wielding a golf club and a torch, Bacon said, adding witnesses there said Tolliver was threatening the woman’s friends, shouting, “Y’all can go down with her too!”
Officers checked the area, but couldn’t find him, so again they left.
At 1:20 a.m. came a third call: Firefighters were at Ashley Station putting out a fire in the the car belonging to the friend who’d driven Tolliver’s ex from Sixth Avenue to the apartment complex.
This time, police didn’t have to hunt Tolliver down: Witnesses did that for them.
Angry bystanders ran him down, catching him at 10th Avenue and 27th Street, where police arrested him, Bacon said. Officers also found his black gown and golf club.
“We were unable to find any torch,” Bacon said.
Bacon was unsure what sort of black gown Tolliver had been wearing. It might be related to religion, he said.
He said police have not filed any charges against Tolliver in connection with the car fire, which fire department arson investigators are looking into.
Judge Julius Hunter found probable cause to send the case to Muscogee Superior Court. He set no bond on the aggravated stalking charge. Tolliver has a $5,000 bond for first-degree burglary.
This story was originally published June 22, 2018 at 4:21 PM with the headline "Ashley Station crowd runs down man in black gown with torch and golf club, officer says."