Douglas Walker

dwalker@muncie.gannett.com

MUNCIE – Prosecutors on Tuesday filed a total of 25 felony charges against two Muncie men accused of confining three local residents and torturing one with a nail gun.

Robert A. Walton, 55, and Benitez L. “Benny” McCullum, 34, were arrested last Thursday after they allegedly held two women and a man against their will in a building in the 3800 block of Broadway.

The charges, filed Tuesday in Delaware Circuit Court 4 by Chief Deputy Prosecutor Eric Hoffman, provided more details of the torture Walton is accused of inflicting on one of the victims, a 46-year-old woman.

Walton faces 13 charges, including four counts of aggravated battery, a Level 3 felony carrying up to 16 years in prison.

Those counts allege he “used an air gun to shoot staples/nails” into both of the woman’s legs, her “abdomen/torso” and one of her feet.

According to a probable cause affidavit, the woman “had to have surgery to remove the nails that were inside her leg bone.”

Walton is also charged with attempted aggravated battery and battery with a deadly weapon over allegations he placed a metal pipe against the same woman’s knee, which he threatened to break.

He is also charged with three counts each of intimidation and criminal confinement, and a single count of conspiracy to commit criminal confinement. In all, nine of the 13 charges against Walton are Level 3 felonies.

McCullum faces 12 charges – four counts of aiding, inducing or causing aggravated battery; three counts of criminal confinement; two counts of intimidation; and single counts of conspiracy to commit criminal confinement, attempted aggravated battery and battery with a deadly weapon.

McCullum is accused of pressing the barrel of the air gun to the 48-year-old male victim’s neck and striking that man in the head with a shovel.

The third victim, a 37-year-old woman, managed to escape and ran to a nearby convenience store, resulting in police being called to the scene.

Initial hearings are set Monday in Circuit Court 4. Walton continued to be held in the Delaware County jail on Tuesday under a $100,000 bond, while McCullum, the target of unrelated warrants, was being held without bond.

The court documents filed Tuesday do not address any possible motivation for the alleged abductions and violence.

“There is evidence of a motive but I don’t want to comment on that,” Hoffman said. “This was not a random act between strangers.”

Contact news reporter Douglas Walker at (765) 213-5851. Follow him on Twitter: @DouglasWalkerSP.

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