Suspect, victim's wife indicted for alleged roles in July beheading

Henry Baxter

Henry Baxter, the Nashville man whom police charged in the killing and beheading of his adoptive father, has been indicted by a Davidson County grand jury.

Baxter, 37, is now charged with first-degree murder and abuse of a corpse for allegedly killing Erman Thompson, 48.

The indictment also charges Thompson’s wife, Ashly Thompson, with being an accessory after the fact by helping Baxter “avoid arrest, trial, conviction or punishment.”

The grand jury added the corpse abuse charge against Baxter for allegedly mistreating the corpse in “a manner offensive to the sensibilities of an ordinary person.”

According to the Metro Nashville Police Department, Baxter shot and killed Thompson during an argument in July before cutting off Thompson’s head with a shovel and disposed of the body in a vacant lot off of Old Hermitage Avenue.

Thompson’s head was later found in a trashcan outside the South Nashville home where the three lived together.

Baxter is in a Davidson County jail on $750,000 bond.