A verbal dispute in the small community of Honaker, Virginia, ended in gunfire and the death of 39-year-old Scottie Ray Holmes of Richlands on December 30, 2021. Holmes, described as an avid hunter and fisherman who worked as a trim line specialist and spent most of his life in the Richlands area, was fatally shot after an altercation.

Authorities identified 50-year-old Timothy Eulis Coleman as the person who shot Holmes. Multiple witnesses reported Coleman fired on Holmes and then fled; the vehicle Coleman used to escape was found later that day in Cleveland, Virginia. A multiagency manhunt involving local, state, and federal authorities followed.

On December 31, 2021, officers located Coleman and moved in to arrest him; Coleman fatally shot himself with a pistol as officers approached. He later died at a local hospital despite immediate life-saving efforts. The Russell County Sheriff’s Office and Virginia State Police investigated both Holmes’s homicide and Coleman’s subsequent death.

Did anyone in the Honaker or Richlands area witness the altercation or have information about what led up to it?