In 3 Days, Man Hit By Car, Beaten, Shot

After getting struck by a car Sunday and beaten by an intruder Monday, Tony Hicks returned to a hospital for a third consecutive day when police investigating a convenience store robbery shot him.

A judge at a Thursday hearing ordered Hicks, 42, held on a $100,000 bond, pending a July 13 hearing on charges of aggravated robbery and attempted first-degree murder.

An Athens investigator said the unrelated sequence of hospitalizations — Sunday, Monday and Tuesday — was not the first time police have dealt with Hicks. His criminal record includes a shootout with officers, Detective Bill Matthews said.

A police statement said Hicks was shot after making "aggressive movements" toward officers who were looking to question him as part of an investigation of a Tuesday night convenience store robbery near his apartment.

Records show Hicks had been cornered by officers on a dusty lot behind his apartment when told them he had a gun and threatened to shoot. When he began a countdown, officers shot him in the lower torso. Officers said Hicks did not have a gun but did have a knife.

Hicks was sent to Athens Regional Medical Center and then later taken to University of Tennessee Medical Center, where he was treated and released Wednesday. He was in jail Thursday.

Police said the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation was investigating the shooting. Two officers have temporarily been assigned to administrative assignments.

Hicks said he did not rob the store but ran from officers for another reason.

Police reports show that before dawn Sunday, Hicks was struck outside his apartment by a car driven by a woman who had been revving the engine. The vehicle driver was later charged with aggravated assault. Police said Hicks went to a hospital on his own.

On Monday night, Hicks' apartment was broken into by a knife-wielding burglar, a police report shows. He was robbed after being struck in the face with a coffee mug. Hicks was taken to Athens Regional Medical Center for treatment.

Investigators said Hicks on Tuesday night walked in the Jiffy convenience store intending to rob it. A police report shows one clerk said she noticed a man in the window with a mask over his face. She said the man told her to run or he would kill her and a co-worker. The clerk told officers she ran to a customer's car and then got out of the vehicle and ran to her mother's nearby home.

Another clerk told investigators she saw a man enter the store with a white bandanna covering his face and what appeared to be a gun under his shirt. She said the man struck her and told her to open the register and give him the money, which he took as he fled on foot. Investigators said they recovered the cash.

Police Chief Chuck Ziegler said it has been almost 10 years since the last officer-related shooting in Athens.