One Charge In Murder Case Dropped

A felony charge connected to a murder is dropped in Bradley County courts this morning.

The judge dropped the accessory after the fact charge against Mary Rhodes.

But the second degree murder charge against her fiancee, Jeffrey Hendrix, has been bound over to the grand jury.

Last week a Tennessee trooper found Rhodes and Hendrix with blood all over them.

They were inside a car parked along I-75 in McMinn County.

Rhodes testified she told troopers they would find Ed Perry back in this Cleveland apartment and that he was dying.

She said her fiancee and Perry got into a knock-down drunken fight.

She says Hendrix hit Perry in the face with a floor lamp. Rhodes testified, "I rolled him over and held him, tried to pick him up in my lap. He tried to sputter, but he coughed up blood."

Rhodes, who is two and a half months pregnant, says she didn't run or attempt to call 9-1-1 because she was afraid.

The judge dropped the charge against her but bound Hendrix's second degree murder charge over to the grand jury.