Grand jury indicts teen, man in Fairview triple homicide case

A Buncombe County grand jury has formally pushed the Fairview triple homicide into the next phase of prosecution, indicting 16-year-old Star Grant and 28-year-old Devan Loving on three counts of first-degree murder and one count of felony conspiracy. Grant was charged as an adult, and Buncombe County officials have said the district attorney may pursue the death penalty in her case.

The indictments sharpen the stakes in a case that stunned Buncombe County from the start. They mean prosecutors have presented enough evidence to move beyond the investigative stage and into the slower, more exacting court process that will now determine how the case proceeds toward trial. Loving also faces an additional charge of abduction of a child.

The victims were identified as Travis Eugene Grant, Kimberly Michelle Grant and Sharon Harwood Grant. Deputies first responded to the home on Ashworth Drive in Fairview on May 7 for a welfare check, then returned later that evening at about 7:15 p.m. and found the three dead inside. Additional reporting said the victims were shot and stabbed.

The case quickly turned into a multi-agency search that reached beyond North Carolina. Authorities later found the suspects in Gatlinburg, Tennessee, at a hotel, after a car linked to Grant was seen there. The Buncombe County Sheriff’s Office worked with the North Carolina State Bureau of Investigation, the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation and the Gatlinburg Police Department in the search.

Grant waived extradition and returned to Asheville on May 13. Her first court appearance the next day lasted less than 15 minutes and ended with bond denied. Loving was also held without bond in later court reporting.

The family relationship at the center of the killings has deepened the shock in Fairview and across Buncombe County. Court coverage described Star Grant as the daughter of Travis and Kimberly Grant and the granddaughter of Sharon Harwood Grant. Family members have said the three victims were loving parents and that the killings were a devastating surprise to relatives.

What the indictments do not answer yet is just as important to residents following the case: motive, the exact sequence of violence inside the home and how prosecutors will map the path to trial. For Fairview, the grand jury action marks a grim accountability milestone in what has become the county’s most serious homicide case of the year.