State police: Winooski River search in Middlesex; manslaughter charge in November assault in Bolton

March 30, 2023 | By Lisa Scagliotti

Friday, March 31: This post was updated with the name of the missing woman.

Two bulletins from the Vermont State Police today point to separate tragic incidents in our area. 

State police divers and other investigators were on site in Middlesex much of the day searching for the body of a missing Waitsfield woman in the Winooski River near the bridge on Vermont Route 100B where her vehicle was found on Wednesday. 

On Thursday night around 8:40 p.m., Vermont State Police issued an update identifying the woman as Anne Dillon, 64, of Waitsfield. They said that the Vermont State Police Underwater Recovery Team located her body at about 2 p.m. in the Winooski River in Middlesex. An autopsy will be done at the Chief Medical Examiner’s Office in Burlington, police said, adding that “there is currently no indication that the death is suspicious.”

Police were called around 5:20 p.m. on Wednesday and were asked to do a welfare check of a 64-year-old Waitsfield woman. Her car was located at about 5:30 p.m. near the Route 100B bridge over the Winooski River near the intersection with U.S. Route 2 in Middlesex. Police said troopers found evidence that led them to believe she was in the river. They searched unsuccessfully until dark, police said. 

Crews returned Thursday morning to resume the search and said they considered it a recovery mission. State police units posed a large presence throughout the day including the Underwater Recovery Team with divers in the water, the Unmanned Aircraft Systems Program, Bureau of Criminal Investigations, Field Force Division and Victim Services Unit, according to a state police news release.  

Man charged in November assault in Bolton

Also on Thursday, state police said that a Middlebury man was cited to appear for an arraignment in state court in Burlington next week to face a charge of manslaughter in connection with an assault at a road construction site in Bolton in November. 

State police on Thursday announced the charge for Whitney Grady, age 42 of Middlebury, after 72-year-old David Cheney of East Montpelier died of injuries he suffered from the incident that took place on Nov. 10. 

Both men were working on a road construction project on U.S. Route 2 near Notch Road in Bolton, police said, Cheney as a dump truck driver and Grady as a traffic flagger. 

Investigators said they learned that an ongoing dispute between the two escalated into a physical confrontation at about 1:15 p.m. that day in which Grady repeatedly punched and kicked Cheney. After the assault, police said Cheney went home but he subsequently suffered medical complications related to his injuries and died later that day at the University of Vermont Medical Center in Burlington.

An autopsy at the Chief Medical Examiner’s Office in Burlington found Cheney’s death to be a homicide, the cause being “cardiac complications following blunt force trauma [to] an individual with arteriosclerotic cardiovascular disease.”

On Thursday afternoon, police said that Grady turned himself in at the Williston state police barracks where he was issued a citation to appear for arraignment on Tuesday, April 4, in the Criminal Division of Vermont Superior Court in Burlington.