ASHEVILLE, N.C. - A drifter already sentenced to death for killing a hiker in Florida and serving a life sentence for killing a Buford woman in Dawson County is expected to appear in a North Carolina courtroom later this month.
Court records show 65-year-old Gary Hilton is being transferred from Florida to the federal courthouse in Asheville on July 25 for a first appearance hearing.
Hilton was indicted last month on two counts of first-degree murder for the October 2007 slayings of a North Carolina couple. Investigators say 84-year-old Irene Bryant was beaten to death and her 80-year-old husband shot after Hilton camped on the Pisgah National Forest trail waiting for victims.
It was a month before Irene Bryant's body was found and four months before a hunter discovered her husband's skeletal remains.
In the Dawson County case, Hilton pleaded guilty to kidnapping Meredith Emerson from a hiking trail in Union County and then killing her in woods in Dawson County.
(AccessNorthGa.com's Ken Stanford contributed to this story.)
Friday
March 14th, 2025
11:03AM
