EASTPOINT — The 40-year-old Georgia man in custody on murder charges stemming from a March 5 shooting at a Rainbow Gathering in the Apalachicola National Forest has been transferred out of the hospital and into the county jail.
After a little more than two weeks recuperating at Weems Memorial Hospital under round-the-clock guard, Clark Mayers, of Milledgeville, Georgia, was moved April 2 to the county jail, where he is being held without bond on murder charges.
Capt. Brad Segree said Mayers is transported three days a week to Weems to continue his rehabilitation from multiple stab wounds he sustained at the hands of individuals at the Rainbow Gathering in the aftermath of the early morning shooting.
“We’re hoping to get it (Mayers’ rehab) in house,” Segree said.
Mayers is charged with one count of first-degree murder, which carries a possible sentence of death, for the killing of Jacob Cardwell, from Golden Valley, Arizona, believed to be in his late 20s. Eyewitnesses said Cardwell, who went by the nickname Smiley, was shot twice in the abdomen in the early morning incident, sometime before 2:30 a.m.
Mayers also is charged with aggravated battery with a deadly weapon, a second-degree felony, for shooting 24-year-old Wesley Jones, who goes by the name Dice. Jones is undergoing treatment at Tallahassee Memorial Hospital, paralyzed from the effect of three shots, one to his neck. Following the shooting, both Jones and Mayers were airlifted from Sumatra to Tallahassee and were treated down the hall from each other.
Rainbow Gatherings are annual meetings connected with the Rainbow Family of the Living Light, a loosely defined collection of people associated with hippie culture. The original Rainbow Gathering was in 1972, and has been emulated throughout the year, in regional gatherings, often in national forests.
Mayers has retained attorney Richard H. Smith of Tallahassee, who has entered a written plea of not guilty on his client’s behalf. Smith did not respond to a request to discuss the case.