Law enforcement personnel spent most of Tuesday (June 17) investigating an early morning shooting at this Cullowhee Mountain Road home. When officers arrived shortly after 1 a.m., they found Ronnie Ray Hornbuckle, 32, dead on the bedroom floor, said Jackson County Sheriff Jimmy Ashe. Hornbuckle sustained four wounds from a .45-caliber handgun, Ashe said. Charged with second-degree murder in connection with Hornbuckle's death is his wife, Stephanie Lynn Hornbuckle, 30, who is being held in the Jackson County Jail under a $50,000 bond, Sheriff Ashe said Wednesday morning. Ronnie Hornbuckle was an assistant to the district attorney for the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians, according to Ashe. Hornbuckle's body, initially examined by a local medical examiner, will be taken to the chief medical examiner's office in Chapel Hill. The couple's two children, ages 3 and 11, were at home when deputies arrived, the sheriff said. Crime scene experts from the State Bureau of Investigation assisted at the scene. -Herald photo by Rose Hooper
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