 |
It seemed like a routine enough call on that Sunday night, August 5, 1990,
when Officer Terry Lyles and another officer responded to a domestic disturbance call at
2500 Remington Street, a tiny neighborhood off Beatties Ford Rd, in northwest Charlotte. Officer
Lyles arrested 44 year old Calvin Christmas Cunningham on the charge of communicating
threats, searched him and placed him in the back seat of the patrol car. The prisoner had
concealed a tiny .22 caliber revolver-type derringer in his underwear and on the way to
the Mecklenburg County Jail, the prisoner fired 2 shots at Lyles while he was driving and
a third shot to just over his right eye, after Lyles swerved the car and stumbled out to
shout to residents to call 911. Mortally wounded, he died the next day.
Cunningham became the first man in 30 years, only the second in history, to be
sentenced to die for murdering a Charlotte police officer. Unfortunately on appeal, the death sentence was overturned and he was sentenced to life in prison.
|
