Just before 8:30 p.m. Thursday, the TBI reported, deputies with the Blount County Sheriff’s Office pulled an SUV over in the city of Maryville on U.S. Route 411.
It was not immediately known why deputies pulled the vehicle over along the two-lane highway about 16 miles south of Knoxville. The shooting scene was about 35 miles north of the Great Smoky Mountains."
This the hardest thing I've ever done," Blount County Sheriff James L. Berrong said through tears during a press conference Thursday night after the shooting.
Berrong, whose held the title of sheriff since 1989, identified the slain deputy as Greg McCowan.
According to a post on the sheriff’s department's Facebook page, McCowan graduated from the police academy in October 2020.
