Published: July 21, 2008 11:54 pm         

Man in custody for alleged Seventh Street shooting

Victim undergoes surgery Monday

TERRE HAUTE — A man was in police custody Monday night after allegedly shooting a man and leading police in a pursuit.

Nevelland Thompson Jr., 72, was arrested on allegations of aggravated battery, criminal recklessness and felony resisting law enforcement after allegedly shooting Shane Wheeler in the abdomen in the back yard of a home in the 400 block of South Seventh Street shortly before 6 p.m.

Wheeler, 35, was in surgery at press time, according to a hospital spokeswoman. Other information about his condition was not available.

Police said Thompson drove off in a white Ford pickup truck with a cap over the bed from Poplar Street to Harding Avenue, where he headed north toward the Vigo County Courthouse and east on Ohio Boulevard, turned north on Third Street and was stopped in traffic on Cherry Street. Members of the Indiana State University Police Department spotted the truck at Cherry Street and tried to stop him with pepper spray, according to the Terre Haute Police Department.

He allegedly continued to flee into the parking lot of the Vigo County Jail on Cherry Street, where officers took him into custody, then to the hospital for treatment.

It was unclear why the shooting occurred, police said. Thompson’s vehicle was impounded. The gun was not found.

A Terre Haute police officer was involved in a minor accident when trying to join the pursuit. The officer was headed west on Cherry Street with his lights and sirens activated when a motorist in a black pickup truck headed north on Third Street struck the officer’s front driver’s end.

The driver of the truck told police he heard sirens and noticed the other police cars involved the pursuit and didn’t see the car headed west on Cherry Street.

Back on South Seventh Street, neighbors were notifying their landlords of their plans to move as investigators gathered evidence.

Alice Ramey, who for about seven years has lived next door to the apartments where the shooting occurred, heard the shot and saw a man put the gun in his pants and take off in a truck.

She said she knew he was the shooter because he allegedly pulled a gun on

a neighbor a couple of

weeks ago.

Like other neighbors, she said she plans to move because she doesn’t want to put her grandchildren in

danger. They play in her

back yard.

“Police all the time, ambulances and fire trucks,” she said about the neighborhood, noting her husband recently was shot in the stomach with a BB gun as he walked to CVS on Ninth and Poplar.

Crystal Garcia can be reached at (812) 231-4271 or crystal.garcia@tribstar.com.