Sergeant Anthony Scott Futrell, 38 years old, was
killed on Wednesday, July 17, 2002, when a single-engine plane he was flying
crashed while he was searching for marijuana growing in fields in North
Carolina. Also killed in this crash were Robert Stephen Kennedy, 46, a Major
and Assistant Chief with the Boone Police Department and Richard Edward
Ashley Jr. 35, a deputy with the Chowan County Sheriff’s Office.
Sergeant
Futrell, a 15-year veteran of the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Department
was the head of the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Helicopter Unit where he
piloted it’s helicopters and coordinated it’s helicopter training. During
his career, he worked as an instructor at the department’s training academy,
earned his EMT certification, served on the SWAT team, did swift water
rescues, helped organize a civil disobedience team, and was a member of
ALERT, a group of emergency responders who would be first to respond to the
scene of a terrorist attack. He also directed the state’s counter drug
operations for the Civil Air Patrol
