The charges against a Varney resident accused of beating an elderly man, who he says he was trying to help, were dropped Thursday when the complaining officer failed to show up for court.

David Michael Roberts, 41, brought court documents to the Williamson Daily News yesterday, showing the malicious wounding charges against him were dropped in Mingo Magistrate Court Nov. 5, when witnesses failed to appear against him. The arresting officer was Mingo Sheriff’s Department’s Lt. J.D. Ferris, who responded to the 911 call Oct. 21, 2009. The call was in reference to an injury to 93-year-old Buddy Mounts of Taylorville. As previously reported in the Williamson Daily News, Ferris wrote in the complaint that Mounts ear had been torn from his head and was hanging by a small amount of skin. When Ferris talked with alleged witness Jamie Butcher, Ferris wrote, Butcher told him he saw Roberts flee Mounts’ apartment and go into his, wiping blood from his hands. Butcher also told Ferris he saw blood on Roberts’ shirt.

Ferris wrote in the criminal complaint that Mounts told him Roberts tried to rob him.

Ferris returned to the apartment building at Taylorville the next day and arrested Roberts, charging him with malicious wounding. Roberts was jailed on a $10,000 bond.

There was blood on his shirt, Roberts said, as he attempted to assist the man he calls Mr. Mounts, whom he saw bleeding from his ear. Roberts said he and girlfriend Tammy Hager helped Mounts on various occasions, as he rarely had visitors to the apartment complex where Roberts took care of maintenance issues. Roberts and Hager said they helped Mounts on various occasions, taking hiim to the store, the doctor, and grocery shopping.

“I just helped him anyway I could,” Hager told the Daily News.

Roberts, who said he was “deeply wounded” over the incident which caused him to spend 15 days in the Southwestern Regional Jail at Holden.

Roberts said he and Hager were in the process of renovating Mounts apartment when this incident occurred.

“I don’t know what happened to him,” Roberts said, asserting he got two drops of blood on his shirt when he attempted to help Mounts.

Roberts appeared in court on the charges Oct. 28, but they were dropped when no one showed up. Roberts was released from jail, but the sheriff’s department brought the charges against him again the same day, putting him back in Southwestern Regional before he left the courthouse.

However, when Roberts appeared for the second preliminary hearing on the charges, no one showed up to testify against him. Magistrate Dee Sidebottom dropped the charges.

“Trying to help somebody can turn against you,” Roberts said, asserting he was not going to return to the apartment complex where he was working and living, as he wanted any further conflict.