Two Hokes Bluff Men Jailed on Charges of Arson and Abusing a Corpse

Motes x2Two Piedmont men were in the Cleburne County Jail on Wednesday, charged in connection with a May 2013 camper fire in Borden Springs, in which Cheryl Motes – then age 46 – was found dead.

Chief Deputy Michael Gore with the Cleburne County Sheriff’s Office, said that the woman’s husband, Charles Waylon Motes, 46, and his brother Hank Lamar Motes, 59, were charged with arson and abuse of a corpse on March 20th.

Cheryl Motes was found, after the fire, in the camper in which she and her husband lived.

The initial investigation ruled out all electrical and natural causes of the fire.

Investigators called the Alabama Fire Marshal the day of the fire to request that the office’s accelerant-sniffing dog inspect the scene.

The dog then alerted them to the presence of a fire accelerant. The investigators submitted samples taken from the fire to a lab, which confirmed the presence of accelerants.

An autopsy, which showed that Cheryl Motes had died of an undetermined cause before the fire started, came back in February.

That investigation is still on-going – and people are coming forward with more information since the Motes brothers were arrested, so there may be more charges.

Bond for both men has been set at $250,000 each for the second-degree arson charge, and $250,000 each for abuse of a corpse.

Preliminary hearings are scheduled for April 2nd.

(The Anniston Star/www.theannistonstar.com)

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