A local man who spent months behind bars returned from jail to find that the friend he trusted to look after his vehicle had instead sold it out from under him.

According to Crossville Police Department reports, the victim was incarcerated at the Cumberland County Justice Center from February 3 to August 25, 2026. Before entering custody, he parked his 1992 Toyota Paseo at a local Dollar General and signed the keys over to a friend, Ronald Adkins, with the understanding that Adkins would safeguard and maintain the vehicle.

However, investigators reviewing recorded jail phone calls uncovered a months-long deception. While the inmate regularly called from jail to check on the status of his car—asking about transmission repairs and maintenance—Adkins repeatedly lied, claiming the vehicle was sitting in his driveway, being worked on by a mechanic, or parked at a transmission shop. In reality, jail recordings revealed Adkins had possession of the car, drove it, and ultimately surrendered the open vehicle title in Georgia, where the car was registered to a new owner by April.

The scheme unraveled in late October when the car owner visited the Cumberland County Clerk’s Office to request a lost title, only to be informed that the paperwork had already been transferred out of state.

When confronted by law enforcement, Adkins claimed that the owner had gifted him the vehicle and that he sold it because it belonged to him. Armed with the incriminating jail phone call recordings, Officer King secured an arrest warrant charging Adkins with theft of property.

Because the vehicle has already been legally registered to a new owner in Georgia using the surrendered title, it will not be listed as stolen in the NCIC database. Police have secured the recorded phone call evidence, and the case has been cleared.