Holly

Verified Timeline

Lore & Background

On the morning of April 13, 2011, Bobo awoke at 4:30 a.m. to study for an exam. At 7:30 a.m., she answered a call from her boyfriend, Drew Scott, who was turkey hunting nearby. Her parents had left for work, and her brother, Clint, was still asleep. Twelve minutes later, Bobo made her last cell phone call; after that, all calls and texts were incoming and unanswered. Shortly after that call ended, a neighbor heard a scream from the Bobo residence. Clint was awakened by the family dogs barking and saw Holly outside with a man dressed in camouflage. He later said, 'It appeared to be Holly kneeling down and Drew [Scott]. They looked like they were kneeled down, facing each other in the garage, and they were talking back and forth. Holly sounded very upset and heated.' Clint believed the couple were breaking up. At some point, Bobo's mother, Karen, called home and told Clint, 'That's not Drew. Get a gun and shoot him.' Clint replied, 'You want me to shoot Drew?' Karen called 9-1-1 but reached a dispatcher for the wrong county. Clint later saw the man walking with Holly into nearby woods and noted the man was larger than Drew Scott. He tried calling both Holly's and Scott's cell phones, but neither answered. When Karen called again, Clint told her what he witnessed and was instructed to call 9-1-1. He fetched a loaded pistol, went outside, found bloodstains belonging to Holly in the garage, and dialed 9-1-1. Police arrived ten minutes later. Cell phone pings showed Holly's phone moving north to a wooded area near Interstate 40, where her remains were eventually found. After stopping for 20-30 minutes, the phone began traveling south using a different route. The last ping came from the area where both the phone and its SIM card were later found.

In Their Own Story

Clint described the man as 5 feet 10 inches to 6 feet tall, weighing 180–200 pounds, with dark hair long enough to cover his neck and touch his collar, wearing a hat and camouflage clothing from head to toe in either Mossy Oak break up or leafy wear pattern, with a very deep and low voice. Extensive searches found several of Bobo's items scattered throughout town: her lunchbox, a receipt with her name on it, a card from school, her cell phone, and a SIM card removed from the phone. Early in the investigation, the TBI focused heavily on a registered sex offender named Terry Britt, who matched the witness description; his home was wiretapped and searched, but he was never charged. In September 2014, Bobo's partial remains were found by ginseng hunters in a wooded area of northern Decatur County, nearly 20 miles from Darden. The property owner, Gary Tubbs, said it was not uncommon for people to hunt there without permission. Larry Stone, one of the men who found the remains, saw a large bucket in the woods, upturned it, and found a human skull beneath it. He then spotted Bobo's remains spread on the ground behind him. Investigators recovered Bobo's skull and teeth, several ribs, and one shoulder blade. Her skull had a bullet hole in the back of it; the bullet entered the back-right side of her head and traveled to the front-left side, fracturing her left cheekbone when it exited. Six men have been arrested for varying degrees of involvement. The first arrest occurred in March 2014 before the discovery of Bobo's remains. Zach Adams, his brother Dylan Adams, and friend Jason Autry were charged with especially aggravated kidnapping, first-degree murder, and rape. Two other men, Jeffrey and Mark Pearcy, were arrested on charges of accessory after the fact and tampering with evidence, but charges against them were dropped. Another man, Shayne Austin, committed suicide without any charges filed against him. It is unclear what initially led law enforcement to suspect these men, but the investigation began with the arrest of Dylan Adams on unrelated weapons charges. After this arrest, he told police that he witnessed Bobo alive with his brother at Zach's home after her abduction. An affidavit states Dylan told authorities that on April 13, 2011, he went to Zach's residence to get his truck and 'observed Holly Lynn Bobo sitting in a green chair in the living room wearing a pink t-shirt, with Jason Wayne Autry standing just a few feet away.' He also said Zach was 'wearing camouflage shorts, black cut-off-sleeve t-shirt and a pair of green Crocs' and that Zach told him 'he had raped Bobo and videotaped it.' The alleged videotape has not been found. Dylan later recanted the confession and alleged he was coerced, but his confession led to the arrests of Zach Adams, Jason Autry, and Shayne Austin. Many details in the confession were eventually found to be inconsistent with the known evidence. In early 2017, it was announced that Jason Autry had agreed to testify against Zach in exchange for leniency. On September 22, 2017, a jury found Zach guilty on all charges, including first-degree murder; he was sentenced to life imprisonment plus 50 years on September 23 and maintains his innocence. In January 2018, Dylan accepted an Alford plea and was sentenced to 35 years in prison. Autry made a plea bargain to testify against Zach in exchange for a significantly reduced sentence. On September 16, 2020, after accepting a deal that reduced his sentence to eight years of time served, Autry was released from Riverbend Maximum Security Institution in Nashville. Autry subsequently recanted his entire testimony against Zach and confirmed he was then given access to the discovery material, allowing him to synchronize his testimony with the available evidence. In January 2024, Adams filed a petition that his conviction be overturned on the basis of this new evidence.

Reader's Guide

The case has met with several setbacks: the death of a suspect, multiple changes to the prosecutorial team, and disputes with the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation (TBI). The prosecution has been heavily criticized for refusing to produce evidence against the defendants, missing multiple discovery deadlines, and making frequent changes to the charges with little explanation. The TBI even briefly withdrew its services to the entire district after the prosecutor accused the agency of compromising the case by proceeding 'so slowly that the culprits were always one step ahead and that TBI . . . was leaking information and possibly covering up evidence.' Defense attorneys reported that, over a year after the arrests were made, they had still not received a bill of particulars detailing the case against their clients and the results of forensic testing done on evidence from the case, so they filed motions to dismiss charges on the grounds of 'silence or stonewalling.' The arrests took place in early 2014, but it was not until July 2015 that it was announced that the defendants finally received access to all evidence against them. In 2014, District Attorney Matt Stowe said he and the TBI were still 'actively looking' to bring criminal charges against additional people, although he declined to name the parties or the charges.

Did You Know?

• Holly Bobo was a 20-year-old nursing student at the University of Tennessee at Martin at The Parsons Center in Parsons at the time of her disappearance.
• Her brother Clint initially mistook the man leading her into the woods for her boyfriend Drew Scott, because the man was wearing camouflage and they appeared to be talking.
• Bobo's partial remains were found in September 2014 by ginseng hunters who upturned a bucket and found her skull underneath.
• The bullet that killed Bobo entered the back-right side of her head and exited the front-left side, fracturing her left cheekbone.
• Jason Autry, who testified against Zach Adams in exchange for a reduced sentence, later recanted his entire testimony and said he was given access to discovery material to synchronize his story with the evidence.