MEMPHIS, Tenn. — Ronnie Eaton lives on Patterson Street in Trumann, Arkansas and would frequently visit his neighbor, Grady Deboard.
“I’d come by every morning, and me and him would drink coffee together. He was a good old fella,” he said.
Eaton says he was shocked to hear that Deboard was found buried in the back yard of a home in Southaven, Mississippi some 60 miles away.
When we showed Eaton and his neighbor Bill Collett a picture of Michael Guidry, the man charged with murder in the case, they recognized him immediately.
Eaton says Guidry once lived across the street from him in Trumann and threatened him after he complained about his dog.
“The pitbull kept trying to bite me, and I told him to put his dog up. He ran out in the highway and had a baseball bat like he was going to hit me. I stopped him in his tracks and told him what I was going to do.”
Eaton says, not long after that, Guidry and a woman moved in with Deboard. That’s when he says he noticed a change in the way his friend acted.
“I told Mr. Grady. I said, ‘I think you got the wrong people living with you.’ At that point, he wouldn’t say nothing. He acted like he was scared.”
Eaton believes Guidry took Deboard to Southaven where the man was later found dead.
Police in Trumann would only confirm that Guidry did at one time live there.
For people who knew Deboard, there are unanswered questions.