Her grandfather reportedly shot Travis Sanders as he came to his granddaughter's defense, killing him.
The husband of late country singer Jean Shepard shot and killed his teenage granddaughter’s ex-boyfriend while trying to save her from being stabbed to death in their Nashville home, but it was too late, according to reports.
Police received a call to the home at 3 a.m. on Saturday and found 79-year-old Benny Birchfield lying in the front yard of the home with stab wounds while his granddaughter, 18-year-old Icie Sloan-Hawkins, was inside also suffering from stab wounds.
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She was transported to the hospital but later died, according to reports.
Her ex-boyfriend, Travis Sanders, was found dead in the house of a gunshot wound inflicted by Birchfield, reports said. Police said Birchfield fired 5 shots.
Sloan-Hawkins’ mother, Velvet Sloan, told The Tennessean that her daughter dated Sanders, 21, earlier that year but they’d broken up after a tumultuous relationship
Birchfield reportedly heard the former couple fighting in the basement. Sanders reportedly attacked Birchfield with a knife, and Birchfield shot Sanders, Sloan told the paper.
Sloan-Hawkins’ had been living with her grandpa since the death of her grandmother in September, who died of Parkinson’s disease.
"It's just such a shame," Bob Adams, Velvet Sloan's fiancé, told the paper. “She was a wonderful girl and a wonderful person, and for this to happen to her, it could happen to anybody.”
Sloan also said Sanders did not live at the residence.
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Birchfield has since been released from the hospital after undergoing surgery, according to reports.
According to reports, he will not face any charges.
Sloan-Hawkins will be buried next to her Shepard's first husband, the late country music singer Hawkshaw Hawkins, according to the paper.
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