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District Attorney receives injunction to close Economy Inn
MIKE SMITH
On Friday morning, Sept.17, members of the Dyersburg Police Department as well as the 29th Judicial District Attorney General’s Office converged on the Economy Inn, located at 1004 Hwy. 51 Bypass, to serve the owner with a temporary injunction/restraining order forcing the business to cease operations.
Shortly after 9 a.m. members of the DPD began knocking on doors to inform guests staying at the Economy Inn they had until 6 p.m. Friday to vacate the premises.
The move to close the motel is something District Attorney General Danny Goodman said was a way to continue to curb crime involving everything from drugs to rape as well as attempted rape. The filing of the petition to temporarily close the Economy Inn was done in Chancery Court.
“One of the things we’ve discovered is we can use a civil tool to help in a criminal case. We’ve started to identify high crime areas and obtain injunctions to actually close places like this down,” explained Goodman. “Though this is a temporary injunction, if they are able to open back up, they will have to make changes so that the environment will actually be safe.”
The petition to close the motel came following a year-long investigation by the Dyersburg Police Department.
According to the filing document, between Aug.20 of 2020 and Aug.20, 2021 the DPD responded to 263 calls for service at the Economy Inn. The calls for service resulted in arrest for a variety of crimes including possession of and the sale of narcotics, assaults, domestic assaults, suspicious persons, intoxicated persons, overdose victims and thefts.
During the past year, 52 arrests were made with 20 of those being felony charges while 32 were for misdemeanors.
“The Economy Inn has had a long history of criminal activity. The police department’s enforcement and suppression efforts have continued to drain the department’s resources without achieving the desired outcome of restoring public safety to the entire area that surrounds this property,” explained Isbell. “We have no choice but to take this action and seek to have this property declared a nuisance. We are working with our community partners to assist those who are in need with relocation efforts until the courts determine the next course of action.”
While the injunction is temporary —owner Bob Patel is scheduled to appear in court on Sept.20 — Goodman said members of his office have been discussing how to combat high crime areas other than through arrests and Friday morning was a step in the next phase of decreasing crime.
“The first step was to move forward with the gang injunctions and the next phase is to find areas that our high in crime and try to do whatever we can to close those down,” added Goodman. “What you will see coming soon is if we find a house or residence we believe there is a lot of traffic and drug activity going on, we’re going to start obtaining injunctions to close those down as well.”
Goodman wanted to send a message to anyone and everyone participating in criminal activity in both Dyer and Lake counties that his office is taking the necessary steps to rid the communities of those breaking the law.
“If you are participating in criminal activity, we’re going to use every tool possible to come after you and make things safe for our law abiding citizens,” he added. “This is not the place you want to come and hide and get involved in criminal activity because we’re taking every legal step we can to end it, and we’ll find you.”