A white North Carolina man has been charged with the hit and run death of a Black man after the two apparently had an argument over a bucket.
Anthony Hill died after a truck driven by Paul Steven Voss Jr. struck him multiple times on Sunday, according to what witnesses told Triad City Beat. Hill is Black and Voss is white. Ryan Pressley, a Greensboro resident who saw the incident, said Hill and Voss, who police said knew each other, were arguing over a bucket before tragedy struck.
Pressley told the outlet Hill tried to grab the bucket and Voss drove off with Hill dangling from his truck. Hill was thrown into some tree limbs and able to stand up. Voss pulled around again, Pressley claimed, and hit Hill with the vehicle. Voss reportedly backed over Hill twice before he left the scene. Police were called and discovered Hill’s lifeless body when they arrived.
Voss turned himself in to police and was charged with first-degree murder. Investigators don’t believe a hate crime occurred.
“We don’t believe it is racially motivated in any way,” police spokesperson Ronald Glenn told Triad City Beat.
Hill’s community remembered him fondly.
“He was a good-hearted person,” Barbara Purcell, his aunt, told The Greensboro News & Record. “He tried to help everybody.”
“Anthony, when he walked through the neighborhood, no matter what time of day, he would wave,” recalled neighbor Renee Brooks.
A few days before his death, Hill trimmed a tree for Pressley’s grandmother. The limbs Hill discarded on the curb were the same ones he slammed into moments before his death.
“It’s crazy to think he did that job from my grandmother, and then he got thrown off that truck into those limbs, and then got run over right next to the limbs,” Pressley told Triad City Beat.
Pressley said his neighbors are familiar with Voss but don’t hold a high opinion of him.
“They said the man doesn’t like Black people; he just comes to buy crack,” Pressley said. “He stays near here out in the country.”
Pressley claims Hill’s death wasn’t the first time Voss weaponized his truck.
“He already tried to run over three teenagers near the bottom of Acorn,” he said. “The only reason they got away from him is he hit a fence and they were able to jump over the fence.”
