Two jailed after Friday incident in Claxton

An incident at the Weigel’s in Claxton on Friday night sent two people to jail.Deputies Lounicia Bolton and Kevin Scott Perkins each responded to a call of a disturbance at the convenience store and gas station on Clinton Highway shortly after 10 pm Friday.

A man and a woman, according to store employees, were refusing to leave the store and were causing a disturbance. Perkins spoke with the pair—later identified as 33-year-old Travis Maples of Knoxville, and 29-year-old Kelly Phillips of Clinton—and described Maples as appearing to be under the influence of a stimulant, making sudden jerking movements with his hands, and yelling that he had paid for $3.00 worth of gas but that the pump had never been turned on. More deputies arrived, and when Perkins asked if he had any weapons on him, Maples said “yes,” and made a sudden movement with his hands toward his waistband.

Deputies gained control over Maples and took a large, fixed-blade knife from his waistband. He continued to resist efforts to search him and was taken to the ground so deputies could cuff him.

Deputies checked with dispatchers and learned that Maples had two outstanding warrants for his arrest out of Anderson County, so he was taken into custody on those charges as well as charges of disorderly conduct and resisting arrest. The SUV he and Phillips had arrived in was determined to have the wrong license plate on it and a check of the Vehicle Identification Number revealed that the vehicle belonged to Enterprise Rental Company, representatives of which said that the SUV was showing up as stolen in their system but had not been reported stolen to law enforcement. The vehicle was impounded so that it could be retrieved at some point by the company.

Meanwhile, while that was going on, Deputy Bolton spoke with Phillips, who initially gave the officer a false name, admitting her true identity only after her real name was discovered. She was also found to have active warrants for her arrest out of Anderson County, so she was arrested on those warrants as well as a charge of filing a false report (in this case, for giving the wrong name to deputies).

A puppy in the SUV with the pair was turned over to Anderson County Animal Control officers.