Jerry Stubblefield breaks neck in scooter accident:Vocational director hurt in Galtinburg during conference

By WILL STEWART / Staff Reporter for the Southern Standard(McMinnville, Tenn.)

STUBBLEFIELD

Warren County Schools vocational director and former county commissioner Jerry Stubblefield broke his neck Wednesday as a result of a motor scooter accident in Gatlinburg. It is thought he has suffered no paralysis and will make a full recovery.

“We’re very lucky and very blessed,” said his wife Brenda. “It could have been so much worse.”

She said the accident occurred when Stubblefield was in Gatlinburg attending a vocation directors conference. On Wednesday he and two of his fellow vocation directors rented motor scooters and took a tour of the surrounding mountains.

“He was being very careful and was not speeding. In fact he was probably going too slowly,” Brenda said. “He was taking a curve on the inside and didn’t see traffic backed up the hill ahead of him.”

His friends immediately rushed him to a hospital in nearby Sevierville. There doctors determined he should be sent to the trauma center at UT Medical Center in Knoxville, where he has undergone surgery and is expected to remain through early next week.

Brenda said doctors are optimistic for a full recovery as her husband is conscious and talking and able to move his fingers and his toes, though she said it’s still too early to know exactly how long his recovery will take.