Suspect charged in death of Butler Co. man found in freezer

BUTLER CO., AL (WSFA) - Adrian Carter, 25, of Greenville has been charged with murder in the death of Michael Graham.

Butler County Sheriff Kenny Harden says Carter shot and killed Graham and placed his body inside a deep freezer in Graham's mobile home outside of Greenville in July.

According to the Sheriff, Carter then took off in Graham's car and later abandoned it in Georgia.

Authorities tracked him to North Carolina and he was held as a person of interest in the case as the investigation unfolded.

He has been extradited to Butler County and was officially charged with murder Thursday as well as theft of property.

He is being held in the Butler County Jail on a $300,000 bond.

Harden said the two men were acquaintances and that Carter had been staying at Graham's home on and off. The motive in the deadly shooting is unknown, the sheriff indicated.

District Attorney Charlotte Tesmer says Graham, who was initially thought to be missing, died from a single gunshot wound to the back of the head and was then put in his chest freezer.

The investigation into Graham's disappearance led authorities on a tri-state search that ended 10 days later back at his mobile home outside of Greenville.

Twists and turns in the case took members of the Butler County Sheriff's Office to Georgia and then North Carolina. Due to the evidence they uncovered, they returned to the 39-year-old's house where they found his body inside the freezer. Graham had not been seen or heard from in nearly two weeks.

Graham's relatives had hoped and prayed for a much different outcome.

"It's just so sad because he was more like a brother to me, not just my uncle," his niece, Tasha Graham, said. "He was real sweet. He wouldn't harm anyone."

Graham, who many called "Wayne," was last spotted leaving his home on Butler County Road 38 (South Shackelville Road) off of AL-10 (Pineapple Highway) around 2 p.m. on Sunday, July 12. Family members thought he was headed to a friend's house in nearby Georgiana, but he never made it there. They reported him missing July 14, concerned when he didn't show up for work two days in a row at Hwashin America Corp. without notice.

Graham's relatives knew it was out of the norm for him to travel very far or stay out of touch for long without bringing them in the loop.

At first, it was not clear if foul play was a factor in the case. An initial walk-thru of Graham's home by investigators did not raise any red flags.

Graham's blue 2010 Nissan Pathfinder was found abandoned along the interstate north of Atlanta, but there were no signs of the missing man. Authorities then tracked the driver of Graham's vehicle to North Carolina.

"To start with, we just had a missing person and we've had that before. An adult would go off and wouldn't tell anyone and we've found them in different cities where they went off for whatever reason. This time, when the car was located in Georgia, that gave us somewhere to start. And we were able to find out that the person who was driving that car had gotten picked up and was taken to North Carolina,' said Butler County Sheriff Kenny Harden.

Information gathered in North Carolina led the Butler County Sheriff's Office to suspect foul play, and they got a search warrant for Graham's home on July 24.

"We were able to gather some evidence there, talk to some people. We were able to obtain a search warrant when we came back and searched the house here very good. During the search, we found a body in the freezer," the sheriff said.

Members of Graham's family were devastated as they tried to understand why anyone would hurt their loved one.

"If you needed anything, he would help you. He helped everybody. So if anyone wanted something, all they had to do was ask him for it because that's the kind of person he was," Tasha Graham said. "You never heard anything bad about him because he was a good person."

Graham's death marked the first homicide in Butler County in 2015.

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