A man who called police saying he had fallen off a cliff while being chased by a bear is now wanted on suspicion of murder – after a body was found in the location he phoned from.
Nicholas Wayne Hamlett is suspected of faking his own death by pretending to be a “distressed hiker” named Brandon Andrade during a 911 call on 18 October, Monroe County Sheriff’s Office in Tennessee said on Friday.
The caller said they had fallen off a cliff while running from a bear and was injured and partially in water, the sheriff’s office added.
The call was pinged to the area of the Charles Hall Bridge on the Cherohala Skyway in Tellico Plains, a small mountain town in Tennessee with a population of about 800 people.
Emergency responders and search and rescue teams later attended the scene and found a “deceased male” with an “identification of Mr Brandon Kristopher Andrade on his person”, the sheriff’s office said.
However, detectives later determined that the dead man was not Mr Andrade but rather that “the identification had been stolen and used on multiple occasions”.
They later discovered that Hamlett, who is wanted in Alabama on a parole violation, had been using the ID.
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The sheriff’s office said: “Mr Hamlett had used a false name when speaking with law enforcement… after the distressed hiker call. Before his real identity had been verified, Mr Hamlett is believed to have fled from his Tennessee residence.”
Hamlett is now wanted on suspicion of first-degree murder, with officials warning he is considered armed and dangerous and known to use various aliases.
Anyone who sees him is asked to call 911.
Multiple agencies, including the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation (TBI) and the FBI, are working to identify the deceased man.
