A man who has been sought for more than seven years on failure to appear warrants pled guilty to charges against him during a session of Baxter County Circuit Court on March 10.
Forty-four-year-old Ian Michael Tice was booked into the county jail February 25. The warrants were issued on November 21, 2017, and served February 27.
After he was arrested in Jackson County, Alabama on charges stemming from a domestic altercation, the failure to appear warrants from Baxter County were served on him after he was brought back from Alabama by the Baxter County Sheriffs office.
Tice’s probation was extended by three years on Monday.
Tice and three other people, all of whom have been in trouble with the law, were known to come and go from a building that once housed the Buzzard Roost Inn.
There were allegations of drug use, drug sales and other criminal activity swirling around residents who called the inn home from time to time.
Tax records showed the building was owned at one time by Tice. While in jail in 2016, Tice is reported to have called law enforcement and complained that three people were living on the Buzzard Roost Inn property without his permission. All of those he reported had made the building home at other times when Tice was in residence.
Tice named Scott Froit, Jana Brigman and Michael Scudder as the ones allegedly squatting on his property. Officers located and arrested all three suspects on the property. Froit and Brigman were found to have been living in a fifth wheel camper they had moved onto the land.
In the probable cause affidavit, it only says that Scudder “was located on the property.” Officers reported finding weapons, drugs and paraphernalia used to ingest drugs.
According to the probable cause affidavit, even though electrical service had been cut off at the location, the meter and wiring had been tampered with to allow power to be used without paying.
The most serious charge Tice faced involved two other denizens of the Buzzard Roost Inn –Froit and Brigman. Sheriff’s deputies responded to the scene just before 4 a.m. on August 24, 2016.
The deputies reported that Froit claimed as he was approaching the building, he heard Brigman, identified as his girlfriend, screaming. He said he went to the room and found Tice on top of Brigman. Froit said he brought Brigman out of the room and onto the front porch of the building. Tice had a gun, Froit reported, but he was able to knock it out of his hand. After the confrontation with Froit, Tice is said to have run back to his room.
When investigators contacted Tice, he denied any involvement in the incident and said he had done nothing to the victim. Tice was taken into custody and eventually charged with aggravated assault, possession of drug paraphernalia and residential burglary. In late March 2017, Tice was found guilty of amended charges and sentenced to three years probation. He was eventually found to be out of compliance with the terms and conditions of his probation and petitions to revoke his probation were filed in November 2017.
When he could not be located, Tice was declared a fugitive and court records show he remained in that status until he was jailed February 25.
In late 2016, the former Buzzard Roost Inn burned to the ground. Cause of the fire was listed as undetermined, according to the Baxter County Sheriff’ Office. The investigation showed there was no mortgage or insurance on the building.
At one point, Tice was reported to be living in the Memphis, Tennessee area.
Brigman and Scudder have been in and out of trouble since they lived at the shuttered Buzzard Roost Inn.
Records shows the 54-year-old Brigman, who had been a wanted fugitive since 2019, was eventually arrested in Marion County in early March 2021 when found living in a fifth wheel camper along Trailwood Terrace.
Drugs and drug paraphernalia were located as well as a fully loaded Smith and Wesson 9- millimeter handgun. As a felon, Brigman was not allowed to be around weapons.
She was given a prison sentence, was paroled and now shows to be on active supervision with the Arkansas Division of Community Corrections.
While in the Baxter County Detention Center in August 2021, Brigman jumped from a rail on the second floor of the female pod where she was housed. She made court appearances in a wheelchair after the incident at the jail.
The 50-year-old Scudder was sentenced to five years in prison in February of this year on charges including being a felon in possession of a firearm, possessing a defaced weapon and possession of methamphetamine.
During the past 21 years, Scudder has been charged with crimes in Baxter, Boone and Izard Counties.
As of March 10, he remained in the Baxter County Detention Center awaiting transportation to the state prison system.
At age 52, Froit died on December 5, 2021, at his mother’ residence.
WebReadyTM Powered by WireReady® NSI