DeKalb County has a new attorney.
Brandon Cox took the oath Thursday morning administered by Judge Bratten Cook, II. The brief ceremony was held in the General Sessions Courtroom.
Cox is joining the law office of Sarah Cripps. “We are extremely pleased to announce that Mr. Cox will be associating and joining my law practice. He recently has passed the Tennessee Bar exam and is a graduate of the Nashville School of Law. I am very happy to have him joining my practice,” Cripps told WJLE.
Cox, a lifelong resident of Smithville, is the son of Ms. Virginia Cox, also of Smithville. He graduated from DeKalb County High School in 2004. In May, 2009, Cox graduated from Tennessee Technological University with a Bachelor of Science Degree in sociology.
Brandon graduated from the Nashville School of Law with his Doctorate of Jurisprudence in May, 2013. In July, 2013, he sat for and passed the Tennessee Bar Examination. “It’s really exciting. It’s been a long road with years of school but joining Sarah is going to be great. She has a lot of knowledge and experience and she has been very helpful showing me the ropes. I can’t wait to get started,” Cox told WJLE.
He is married to Whitney Rice Cox. They have one daughter, Cora Marie Cox, who is two years old.
Prior to graduating from law school, Brandon was employed with the Tennessee Department of Children’s Services as a Family Service Worker.
In 2009, he served as the assistant baseball coach at DeKalb County High School.
(In the group photograph above, pictured from left to right are Bob Rice, Whitney Cox’s paternal grandfather; Virginia Cox, Brandon Cox’s mother; Whitney Rice Cox, wife of Brandon Cox; Brandon J. Cox; Cora Marie Cox, daughter of Brandon and Whitney Cox; and Judge Bratten Hale Cook, II.)

The body of a man found floating in Center Hill Lake last Friday has been positively identified by the state medical examiner as Joseph Loupe of Rutherford County.
“The pathologist was able to take xrays to make a positive identification,” Sheriff Patrick Ray told WJLE Thursday afternoon. “The autopsy revealed that Loupe was the victim of a drowning. No foul play is suspected, according to Sheriff Ray.
Loupe’s badly decomposed body was spotted by a fisherman last Friday morning, October 11 on what would have been the victim’s 45th birthday. The remains surfaced in the area of Edgar Evins State Park and Center Hill Marina, near where his boat was found on the day of his disappearance nearly three years ago.
Loupe rented a pontoon boat from Center Hill Marina on Tuesday, November 2, 2010 and set out on the lake. Later that day, the boat was found unoccupied but still in gear and traveling in a circle, about three quarters of a mile from the marina.
” In my career as a law enforcement officer, I never heard of any body surfacing after being in the lake for that long,” said Sheriff Ray.
“We believe he either fell or jumped into the water from the boat. A fanny pack was on the body that contained his identification but since the remains were so badly decomposed, we couldn’t tell who he was. After his body was sent to Nashville for an autopsy, the state medical examiner asked us to see if we could find Xrays to help confirm his identity,” said Sheriff Ray.
At the time of Loupe’s disappearance, the incident was initially treated as a possible boating accident. ” He rented the boat around midday from Center Hill Marina,” said TWRA Officer Tony Cross on the day Loupe went missing. “Approximately 50 minutes to an hour later, the boat was discovered unoccupied out on the lake, still moving, in gear. Several different agencies are working on it. We’re working side by side with the sheriff’s department in DeKalb and Rutherford county,” said Officer Cross.
After getting the boat stopped, an Edgar Evins Marina employee and park ranger began a visual search, scanning the banks and shoreline in the area, before contacting the TWRA.
Officer Cross said there was one sighting of the man on the lake prior to his disappearance. “We had a witness (an employee of Edgar Evins Marina) who saw the rental pontoon and saw that there was a person on board, but he was quite a distance away. He just happened to take notice of it since there is very little boat traffic on the lake right now. He noticed it was a rental pontoon from Center Hill Marina and it looked like one person was on the boat but nothing appeared to be amiss.”
TWRA officers scanned the banks by boat throughout the afternoon and dragging operations by the rescue squad continued until dark, but to no avail.
“As soon as he went missing, we did a missing person report on him,” Sheriff Ray told WJLE Thursday. “We entered him into the National Crime Information Center as missing and over the last three years we did some investigation and checked tips we received but nothing ever came from it,” he said.

Anyone interested in being appointed to the positions of constable in the first, second, or third district may soon apply.
The county commission Tuesday night voted to advertise seeking applicants for the open seats.
Respondents will be interviewed by members of the county commission in an informal meeting. A vote will later be taken on filling the vacant seats at a regular meeting of the commission.
Constable terms are for four years. The last election for constables was in 2012. Five of the seven district seats were filled including Wayne Vanderpool in the third district, Paul Cantrell in the fourth district, Mark Milam in the fifth district, Carl Lee Webb in the sixth district, and Johnny King in the seventh district. No one ran for the positions in the first and second districts. However in recent months persons in those districts have expressed an interest.
Vanderpool has since passed away, creating a vacancy in the third district.
If the commission appoints persons to fill these three positions, the appointees would serve until August 31, 2014. Elections will be held in 2014 to fill the remaining two years of the terms.

A Smithville man is charged with breaking into his neighbor’s apartment and assaulting another neighbor with a knife.
Smithville Police Chief Randy Caplinger said 37 year old Russell Blackwell of City Walk Apartments on East Bryant Street is charged with aggravated assault and aggravated burglary. His bond totals $20,000 and he will be in court on October 31.
According to Detective Brandon Donnell, who investigated the case, Smithville Police received a call of a stabbing on Tuesday at City Walk Apartments. “Sergeant Andy Snow contacted me and I initiated an investigation. It was determined that Blackwell forced his way into an apartment, causing damage to the front door, and started fighting with the resident there. As another neighbor got between the two to try and break up the fight, Blackwell allegedly pulled a large kitchen knife and cut the neighbor several times who was trying to stop the fight. After the assault, Blackwell ran out of the apartment and allegedly threw the knife on top of the building before returning to his own residence in the apartment complex,” said Detective Donnell.
After witnesses identified Blackwell as the man responsible for the assault, police went to his apartment where they found Blackwell and placed him under arrest. The knife was also retrieved from the top of the apartment building.
The wounded man in the knife attack was taken by DeKalb EMS to DeKalb Community Hospital where he was treated and released.