APPOMATTOX - Family and friends of those killed in the Spout Spring massacre are surprised two years later to still be learning information about how their loved ones died.
The Appomattox County Commonwealth's Attorney's Office on Wednesday confirmed that some of those slain were killed as early as Jan. 17, 2010 - two days before their bodies were discovered - and not on Jan. 19 as is listed on the indictments.
Christopher Bryan Speight, 41, faces three counts of capital murder in the slayings of his sister, her husband, his niece and nephew in a home they shared. A neighborhood couple and their teenage daughter, along with a teenage friend, also were found dead at the home on Snapps Mill Road in Appomattox County.
Speight also is charged with the attempted capital murder of a Virginia State Police helicopter pilot who flew overhead after the victims were discovered. He hit the helicopter several times with gunfire, forcing it to land in a field, deputies said.
Melissa Stallard, the sister of victim Jonathan Quarles, said she had always been suspicious about the commonly understood sequence of events in the slayings.
"We had heard rumors the ones in the house had been shot before, but it was never confirmed," she said.
Officials said Lauralee Sipe, 37; her husband, Shannon Sipe, 38; and their 4-year-old son, Joshua, may have been killed two days before the others. The bodies of Lauralee, Speight's sister, and her husband, Shannon, were found in the living room of the home. Their son's body was discovered upstairs.
Investigators have said the bodies of Morgan Dobyns, 15, Lauralee's daughter from another marriage; and Karen Quarles, 43, were discovered on the front porch of the house. Emily Quarles, also 15, was found inside her mother's vehicle in Speight's driveway.
Jonathan Quarles, 43, and Bo Scruggs, 16, left the Quarles home later that morning to check on the women when they didn't return home.
Court records show Scruggs' body was found in the driveway near their vehicle. Jonathan Quarles was found shot but still alive near the end of Speight's driveway around noon Jan. 19, 2010, by passers-by. He died later at Lynchburg General Hospital.
Speight surrendered to law-enforcement officers the morning of Jan. 20 after an overnight standoff near the home.
He is set for a three-week trial starting June 11. He is held without bond at the Lynchburg Adult Detention Center.
Chris Dumond writes for The News & Advance of Lynchburg.
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