High Point man charged in fatal stabbing after dog dispute

A dispute over a loose dog on Bethel Drive in High Point ended with Xavier Martin dead and David Scarborough facing a second-degree murder charge, a case that is now drawing scrutiny because Scarborough had already been convicted in a separate Guilford County homicide.

High Point police said the confrontation began near 1750 Bethel Drive when Martin kicked at a dog running loose in the area. Investigators said the dog’s owner became upset, the argument turned physical and Martin was stabbed during the fight. Martin drove himself to Wake Forest Baptist High Point Medical Center with a severe stab wound, but he died there despite life-saving efforts.

Police arrested Scarborough, 59, at about 1 p.m. on June 5 without incident. Martin was 46. Investigators said they reached their conclusions after speaking with witnesses and family members, and High Point police described the case as isolated, saying there was no ongoing threat to the public.

The history behind Scarborough’s name makes the charge more consequential. Court records show he previously was convicted in connection with a 1986 Guilford County homicide. He had originally faced a first-degree murder charge in that case, then resolved it in 2017 through an Alford plea. He was convicted of second-degree murder and sentenced to 15 years in prison with credit for time served.

That timeline raises the core accountability question in the case: how a man with a prior murder conviction ended up charged again after a neighborhood dispute turned deadly in a residential part of High Point. The facts point to a small conflict with outsized consequences, one that moved from a loose dog to a physical altercation to a fatal stabbing in a matter of minutes.

For Guilford County residents, the setting may be as unsettling as the crime itself. Bethel Drive is not a remote stretch or a known trouble spot, but a place where ordinary arguments can spill into public danger. In this case, a loose animal, a brief confrontation and a history of violence came together with fatal results, leaving police to sort out how a familiar street became the scene of another homicide.