Steven Armstrong
Alec Bearden
Benjamin Catron
Clinton Neal
A man added Friday afternoon to the TBI’s Top 10 Most Wanted list, Steven Blake Armstrong, has been captured in Giles County.
The 22-year-old Lawrenceburg man was one of four men for whom special agents from the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation obtained indictments following an investigation into the rape of a fellow inmate in the Lawrence County Jail. On Friday evening, acting on media broadcasts, a citizen contacted the TBI with information about Armstrong’s whereabouts, which led to his capture by TBI agents and deputies from the Giles County Sheriff’s Department.
On Jan. 30, at the request of 22nd District Attorney General Brent Cooper, TBI agents began investigating the incident, which occurred on Dec. 25, 2014. During the course of the investigation, Agents developed information that Armstrong, Clinton Brant Neal, Benjamin James Catron, and Alec Broc Bearden attacked a fellow inmate and forcibly raped him. The investigation further revealed Neal, 22, of Lawrenceburg, attempted to assault the inmate on two additional occasions in January. The inmate reported the incidents to the jail’s administrative staff, who referred the information to the District Attorney General, who in turn requested a TBI inquiry.
On April 23, a Lawrence County Grand Jury returned indictments for the four men, charging Neal with one count of rape and two counts of attempted rape. The indictments charged Armstrong, Catron, 52, of Leoma, and Bearden, 22, of Summertown, with one count of rape each.