Charges against son stun family

Benson woman, 68, slain in home

BENSON -- Annie Williams Bynum's family gathered at her red-brick home in rural Benson Thursday and wondered, again and again: Why did she die, by all accounts, at the hand of her oldest child?

"Most of the family is in a state of shock," Bynum's son, Edward Bynum of Winston-Salem, said Thursday. "From what they're saying, my brother confessed to killing her. Why? You have to ask him. But for me there's no good reason."

Johnston County sheriff's deputies arrested Annie Bynum's son, Tony Bynum, 42, late Wednesday night, the Sheriff's Office reported.

They charged him with murder but declined to speculate on a motive or manner of death. They could not be reached for comment Thursday evening.

Annie Bynum, a 68-year-old grandmother and mother of two grown sons, didn't show up for her overnight shift Tuesday night at Day by Day, an in-patient addiction treatment center in Selma. Her co-workers worried because it wasn't like her to miss work.

The Day by Day staff called Annie Bynum's sister at daybreak. The sister, Iris Davis, a retired school teacher, and her niece, Cheryl Davis, arrived at Annie Bynum's home on Meadowbrook Road shortly after 7 a.m. They noticed a side door was open. Annie Bynum's car was missing. Cheryl Davis called 911.

Sheriff's deputies found Annie Bynum's body on the floor of her bedroom, her younger son said Thursday.

Earlier drug problem

Edward Bynum wondered whether drugs were at the center of Annie Bynum's death. But even with the spectre of drugs, he cannot imagine his brother becoming so out of control that he would take his mother's life.

"At one point in time my brother had an alcohol and substance abuse habit. She may have been expressing concern that he had returned to drugs, but that was his mom," Edward Bynum said. "I never heard him talk back to her. Plus she was not going to tolerate that kind of behavior, especially from her own child."

Edward Bynum said his brother, a divorced father of two sons and two daughters, had been living with his mother about a month. He said his brother, who works at Wal-Mart, had been living with a woman for nearly a year and then moved back home.

"I last talked with her a week ago," Bynum said. "She never expressed any concerns or said anything about him having any erratic behavior."