Son charged with trying to kill father

PALMER — A near-fatal fight in the Chickaloon area in January has resulted in the filing of attempted murder charges against a 24-year-old man.

A grand jury on May 16 saw fit to charge Hunter Hedrick with attempted murder. He’s alleged to have tried to kill his father, King Mountain Lodge owner Michael Hedrick.

The case first made the news shortly after the Jan. 19 fight, though it remains unclear exactly who did what. Details in the court file are scant. Troopers at the time released very little information.

Essentially, two family members fought at the lodge, according to the trooper narrative. One wound up with life-threatening stab wounds, but still managed to get himself to the Sutton General Store where he was flown to Anchorage in an air ambulance.

The other person was found at the lodge. That person’s injuries were described at the time as “serious.”

It’s unclear, though, who did the stabbing. The only weapon mentioned in the grand jury return from May 16 is “hands.” Prosecutors have declined media outlets’ requests for information. The elder Hedrick has not been charged with a crime in connection with the incident.

Whatever the case, the younger Hedrick has an apparent history of violent incidents, some of them involving his father.

In June of last year, he was hit with criminal mischief and theft charges. Court documents Alaska State Trooper Jesse Lopez filed at the time describe a confrontation between the two Hedricks at the King Mountain Lodge.

During the altercation, the elder Hedrick said someone drove into the parking lot to check out what was happening, and the younger Hedrick waved him down, jumped into the vehicle with him and took off. Later, the elder Hedrick said, he found there was $178 missing from the lodge’s cash register.

The younger Hedrick gave troopers a few different stories as to what happened, saying his father was the one who freaked out and tried to run him down with his pickup. The case is still pending.

In February, Hunter Hedrick made the news in Anchorage for allegedly flying into a rage at the Springhill Suites on University Lake Drive. A report from the time from KTVA Channel 11 News reports that Hedrick fractured multiple bones in a hotel security guard’s face and broke another hotel employee’s arm.

On Jan. 6, the elder Hedrick took out a temporary restraining order on his son saying that in November 2013, his son beat him with his fist while he drove on an icy road. He writes that on Dec. 21, 2013, the younger Hedrick had hit him and tried to stab him with a broken pool stick. He also used a wrestling term for dropping someone on his head to say his son “pile-drived” him to the floor.

He asks the court to order his son to take his psychiatric medications. Notes the court clerk took in hearings in that case indicate that the elder Hedrick believes his son’s problem is illegal drugs.

“When he got out of prison, he did great and then got back into drugs,” the elder Hedrick is said to have told the court. “He is great as long as he is not on drugs.”

As for the King Mountain Lodge, it’s for sale and has been closed down for sometime. Disappointed travelers have posted photos of the shuttered building on the lodge’s Facebook page. The website Online Highways proclaims it the oldest lodge in the area.

Contact Andrew Wellner at 352-2270 or andrew.wellner@frontiersman.com.