David Pruitt, convicted last month of illegally selling fireworks, appeared in Ironton Municipal Court Thursday to face felony escape charges.

Friday, October 20, 2000

David Pruitt, convicted last month of illegally selling fireworks, appeared in Ironton Municipal Court Thursday to face felony escape charges.

Judge Clark Collins scheduled a preliminary hearing in the case for Thursday and set bond at $25,000.

Attorney Phillip Heald was appointed to represent Pruitt.

Pruitt is now serving his five-month conviction for misdemeanor charges of illegally selling fireworks but he’s not being held in the Lawrence County Jail, county prosecutor J.B. Collier Jr. said.

The sheriff’s department filed escape charges against Pruitt when he failed to show at the jail on Oct. 2.

Pruitt and his daughter, Vickki Bailey, pleaded guilty to misdemeanor charges of illegally selling fireworks near their Ohio River Fireworks store in Scottown, where nine people died in a 1996 explosion and fire.

Mississippi authorities arrested Pruitt about five days later. He was transported back to Lawrence County this week.