Fraudulent calls over police radio
land four local teens in court
Three young local men and a juvenile face charges in connection with a hoax emergency call on March 15 that shots had been fired and an officer was hurt.
According to court records, Koubun Matsumoto of Buena Vista and Justin Crowder of Lexington were arrested March 27 on charges of falsely summoning or giving false reports to law-enforcement officials. That is a class one misdemeanor.
Byron Jones of Buena Vista was charged with grand larceny. According to published reports, a police radio was stolen from a volunteer firefighter who put it down at a convenience store.
Crowder is the son of Lexington Police Chief Steve Crowder.
Rockbridge County Sheriff's deputies responded March 15 when calls came over a police scanner alerting them to a shooting on Stoner Hollow Road near Buena Vista. Deputies later determined that the calls were fake and came from a stolen police radio.
All three men are scheduled to appear in court June 20.
Sheriff Bob Day, after discussing the incident on local television last week, declined to release information about it to The Rockbridge Report on Thursday.
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