A Rossville man who was arrested March 11 in Dunlap for drug possession and felony possession of a firearm is mentally competent to stand trial, according to a ruling by U.S. Magistrate Judge Christopher H. Steger.
Charles Henry Skibbe, 56, reportedly told law enforcement officers during his arrest that he wanted to trade methamphetamine for a gun so he could kill his ex-wife.
His trial is set to begin at 9 a.m.
on Dec. 16 before U.S. District Judge Curtis Collier.
Myrlene R. Marsa, an attorney with the federal defense services of East Tennessee in Chattanooga, was assigned to defend him.
The prosecutor is Assistant U.S. Attorney Joseph G. DeGaetano.
In Sequatchie County, where he was originally arrested, Skibbe was charged with drug possession and felony possession of a firearm. Those charges were dismissed later that month, however, after he was indicted by a federal grand jury in Chattanooga for possessing a firearm in furtherance of drug trafficking and other charges.
He was then transferred to the Hamilton County Jail by U.S. marshals.
In his order setting the trial date, Judge Collier set up a schedule for pre-trial deadlines:
Nov. 15 – deadline for plea negotiation and motions
Nov. 20 – final pretrial conference
Nov. 22 – deadline for requests for jury instructions
The statement about his former wife was part of the testimony during Skibbe's hearing in Sequatchie County, when the judge set Skibbe's bond at $50,000 and made one of the conditions of the bond that he "was not to go near the victim."
The federal jury indicted him on charges that he:
· Did knowingly possess . . . a firearm, despite having previously been convicted in court of a crime punishable by imprisonment for a term exceeding one year.
· Did knowingly possess a firearm in furtherance of a drug trafficking crime for which he may be prosecuted in a court of the United States, that is, distribution of a mixture and substance containing a detectable amount of methamphetamine, a Schedule II controlled substance.
· Did knowingly, intentionally and without authority distribute a mixture and substance containing a detectable amount of methamphetamine.
Skibbe’s arrest on March 11 grew out of a sting by the Dunlap Police Department, Sequatchie County Sheriff’s Department, Tennessee Bureau of Investigation and the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms.
“An undercover agent with TBI arranged to meet Skibbe at the Wal-Mart (in Dunlap) where Skibbe would be trading methamphetamine for a firearm,” according to an affidavit of complaint filed March 11 in Sequatchie County by Detective Robert Raber of the Dunlap Police Department.
“The undercover agent was wired with audio recording device where officers could hear Skibbe talking,” the complaint said. “Skibbe handed the undercover agent approximately 3.78 grams of methamphetamine in a red bag in exchange for a handgun. Skibbe took possession of the Taurus Millennium .40 caliber handgun and placed the gun in his truck seat.”
Following the suspect’s arrest, the report noted, officers found “two more bags of white crystal ice substance. Upon weighing . . . the first bag weighed approximately 0.90 grams and the second bag weighed approximately 0.68 grams.”
According to Detective Raber’s affidavit of complaint, Skibbe was convicted of felony grand theft auto in Florida in 2013. Earlier, in Wisconsin, he had been convicted for second-degree recklessly endangering safety in 1996 and as a “felon in possession of a firearm” in 1999.