In the late afternoon of Wednesday, October 24, 2007, the life of a local business owner, 36-year-old Eric Lee Brown, was cut short in a violent encounter that has since gone cold. The male entrepreneur was discovered suffering from a fatal gunshot wound behind his own establishment, Spudz Inc., located at 5908 Charlotte Pike in Nashville. Emergency services were summoned to the scene around 4:00 p.m. after a friend of Brown's made the grim discovery and placed a call for an ambulance. That same friend reported seeing an older model gray car occupied by three Black males leaving the area shortly after the shooting.
Despite the initial lead of the mysterious gray car, the investigation into Eric Lee Brown's murder has yielded no arrests and the case has remained unsolved for years. The Nashville Police Department's Cold Case Homicide Unit continues to seek information from the public, hoping that someone will come forward with a crucial piece of evidence that could bring closure to Brown's family and friends. A cloud of unanswered questions hangs over the death of the man who had started his own business, with the motive for his killing still unknown.
Adding a layer of complexity to his story, court documents revealed that Eric Lee Brown was a felon. In October 2001, he was arrested for possession of a handgun and possession with intent to sell marijuana. He was indicted on both felony counts and received two years of probation, which concluded in 2002. It remains unclear if his past had any connection to his untimely death, a question that lingers as his case awaits a break that could finally lead to justice.
