Woman arrested after allegedly d

A Greenback woman is facing charges after she allegedly drove recklessly through a COVID-19 vaccination site at Foothills Mall to protest vaccines.

Virginia Christine Lewis Brown, 36, Rudd Road, was arrested by Blount County Sheriff’s deputies at 9:46 a.m. May 24 and charged with seven counts of felony reckless endangerment. She was being held on bonds totaling $21,000 pending a 9 a.m. hearing June 7 in Blount County General Sessions Court.

An incident report states a deputy was working the COVID vaccination tent at Foothills Mall when he saw a Chrysler SUV, driven by Brown, going fast through the cones.

The vehicle allegedly also went fast through a tent where several health and National Guard workers were present, then left the tent and continued to drive recklessly through the cones.

After the vehicle left toward CBBC Bank, workers ran over to the deputy, yelling about the car. They told the deputy the vehicle almost hit several people in the tent.

Another deputy working the site also saw Brown’s vehicle speed through the cones and not stop as it drove through the tent, which he estimated contained around 15 people, the report states. Witnesses told the deputy they believed Brown yelled, “No vaccine,” as she drove through, nearly hitting seven workers, the report states.

“I had several victims tell me she almost hit them as she fled through the tent at high speeds,” the deputy wrote in the report. “I was advised that they were within inches and feet of the vehicle as it came through the tent. Several victims stated that they thought the driver was going to kill them.”

The first deputy pulled Brown’s vehicle over at a 3000 block address on Morganton Road. Brown told the deputy she drove through the site to protest the vaccine and that she was only going 5 miles per hour, the report states. The deputy took her into custody and to the Blount County jail.

“While traveling to the jail, Ms. Brown made several statements about wanting to protest the vaccine,” the deputy wrote in the report. “Ms. Brown stated she was driving through the course and, once she got to the tent, she told the personnel there working she was not there for the vaccine.”