A Henderson County man was arrested on May 22 after being accused of assaulting a runner in the Bent Creek Experimental Forest, according to Matt Marshall, spokesperson with the Buncombe County Sheriff’s Office, the Citizen Times reported. The suspect has been identified as Dillon James Curtis.
Who is Dillon James Curtis?
Curtis is 29 years old and from Etowah. He was arrested by Henderson County Sheriff’s Office deputies and charged with assault on a female, communicating threats, false imprisonment and interfering with emergency communication. All of these are misdemeanor charges.
Curtis was arrested on warrants sworn out by Emily Sutherland, 27, an Asheville content creator. Sutherland, an avid hiker and runner, alleged that Curtis followed her in his car May 21, before attacking her while she was running in the popular recreation area in Pisgah National Forest.
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On May 23, Henderson County transferred Curtis to Buncombe sheriff’s custody. Marshall told the Citizen Times. Curtis remains in the Buncombe County jail under a $5,000 bond, per the outlet.
“It looked like he was looking for a parking spot. He ended up parking by the Laurel Creek Trail. I saw him walking, running at me. Initially I thought it was someone trying to warn me about a bear,” Sutherland told the Citizen Times on May 22.
“Whenever he got close to me, he started yelling at me and went to punch me. I backed up. I was like, ‘what’s your problem?’ He started calling me other girls’ names. He started screaming at me. It wasn’t super coherent. He came at me again. I backed up again,” she recalled.
Sutherland then called 911.
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“He told me he was going to knock me out and drag me into the woods. That’s when I just started screaming as loudly as I possibly could for help,” she said. “Probably three, four minutes, I was screaming. He was just threatening me and lunging at me.”
Sutherland was eventually rescued by two mountain bikers, who introduced themselves as Trevor and Harvest. They approached in a pickup truck and gave her a ride back to her car.
Sutherland took to social media to write about her experience. People online identified Curtis, who has some distinctive tattoos, including the numbers “828” on his torso.
