KNOXVILLE, Tennessee — The widow of a Knox County deputy shot and mortally wounded last year while responding to reports of an erratic resident is suing the man's widow, blaming her for letting him have access to guns and ammunition.
Katarina Blakely seeks $10 million in compensatory damages in the Knox County Circuit Court document filed Monday. The lawsuit, prepared by veteran Knoxville attorney T. Scott Jones, names Angela Rose as the sole defendant.
On the night of Oct. 1, 2023, Knox County Sheriff's Office Deputy Tucker Blakely and others were dispatched to the home of Angela and Matthew Rose on Denver Lane in West Knox County. Matthew Rose had been acting erratically. He had more than decade-long history of mental illness and behavioral problems, according to documents.
At one point that night, he took his wife out to one of their vehicles at gunpoint, according to records. When they got outside they encountered a neighbor. Matthew Rose got in his Buick and left, according to a Tennessee Bureau of Investigation review.
Angela Rose and the neighbor called authorities, according to the TBI investigation. She told dispatchers he was intoxicated and she feared he'd hurt himself.
Angela Rose made plans to gather the couple's children and leave the house. But then Matthew Rose returned to Denver Lane.
He told his wife to tell authorities he wasn't at the house, and he ran upstairs to hide in a closet, TBI records state.
According to an interview she gave with the TBI later, Angela Rose told deputies "that he had firearms on him."
Blakely and another deputy went into the master bedroom searching for Matthew Rose. Matthew Rose emerged from his hiding place in the closet and fatally shot Blakely. The other deputy returned fire and killed Matthew Rose.
The lawsuit alleges Rose's widow knew the man had a history of violent and erratic behavior, including a domestic incident involving gunfire in late July 2023 in Michigan. She also knew, the lawsuit states, that he had a history of mental illness.
Still, the lawsuit alleges, Angela Rose was negligent. At the time of Blakely's death, Matthew Rose was under an order of protection from the Michigan incident that barred him from possessing firearms, according to the lawsuit.
According to the document, she still let her husband have access to two rifles and a handgun kept in the home. She also let him keep unsecured ammunition either in the house on elsewhere on the property, the lawsuit states.
"(Angela Rose) took no steps to stop Matthew Rose from leaving or to secure the firearms despite her knowledge of his intentions of going (to a bar) and his propensity for violence, thus enabling him," the lawsuit states.
