FAYETTE COUNTY, Tenn.. – A Mississippi man says his brother had six guns in a stolen vehicle when he got involved in a standoff with law enforcement on I-40 in Fayette County Thursday night.
Lee Sterling said his brother, Marlin McCrory, was released from prison in January and had been trying to get his life back together, but two weeks ago removed his ankle monitor.
He said McCrory showed up at his workplace hours before the standoff and told him he was not going back to prison.
“He said he was going to Tennessee and see his daughters and turn himself in, but he said if I get pulled over before I get there they are going to have to kill me, or I’m going to kill them,” said Sterling. “And when I walked to his truck, I saw all the guns in his truck.”
Sterling said his brother spent several years in prison for a bank robbery in Mississippi and has been locked up most of his life. He said he found out about the I-40 standoff when a Tennessee Trooper messaged him on Facebook.
“They told me that he was in the middle of the interstate; he was drinking heavily and had a gun to his head,” he said. “The highway patrolman wanted me to talk to him over the intercom, but when the SWAT team got there, they didn’t do all that. They didn’t want that.”
The Tennessee Highway Patrol put down spike strips and disabled McCrory’s vehicle, and shut down the eastbound lanes of traffic near exit 42 for six to seven hours.
Early Friday morning, he was taken into custody by the Shelby County Sheriff’s Office and the Germantown Police Department’s Special Operations Unit.
McCrory was transported to the Regional One Medical Center in Memphis for minor injuries and a medical evaluation.
Sterling said he tried calling his brother numerous times during the standoff and was afraid it would end badly.
He said he and his sister wanted their brother to know they still love him and forgive him.
“I told him to turn himself in, but he wouldn’t listen,” said Sterling. “I wish he would have let me help like I tried to.”
In 2018 McCrory left a prison worksite and stole a car. He was arrested in Florida after he crashed the vehicle.
McCrory is charged with felony assault, evading arrest, a felon in possession of a firearm, and vehicle theft.
He is being held in the Fayette County Jail.
