Meet the Solomons. Aaron was a former Nashville news 4 anchor and sports reporter. He is a financial advisor at Merrill Lynch. Angelia, Angie, was a doctor of pharmacology. They have 2 kids Grant and Gracie

They look like your typical American family. Kids go to private school associated with their church. Aaron is well respected and has lots of powerful friends.  But that perfect appearance was just that. Aaron is physically and mentally abusive.  He is very controlling and manipulative.  

In 2013 Angie has had enough. She and the kids have taken to locking themselves in the master bedroom to escape Aaron’s rage and violence.

She wants to divorce Aaron and take the kids somewhere safe. Aaron comes after her and attempts to strangle her with the cord from a blow dryer. He takes her to a hospital and says that she tried to kill herself with an electrical cord. He says the reason the kids sleep with Angie is because Gracie had eye surgery and then Grant wanted to keep her company. 

Aaron and Angie’s parents attempt to have her committed but she is released the following day. All 3 psychiatrists who spoke with Angie said she was calm and seemed to be telling the truth and was very credible. They also said Aaron was volatile and possibly violent after talking to him.  She comes home to an empty house as Aaron had taken the kids and left, after he drained their bank accounts. She files for a restraining order. The following day Aaron files and gets one as well. 

2014 and their divorce is finalized. Angie was told if she didn’t sign it she’d never see her kids again. They go to court and Aaron’s friend the judge says that since Angie was suicidal and had been in a mental hospital, Aaron would get full custody of the kids and Angie could have a couple hours of supervised visitation a week. 

Almost immediately Aaron starts to refuse Angie visitation. And at one point even told the kids she had died so they would stop asking to see her. 

Through all the abuse, Grant was a great big brother and was very protective of his mom and sister. He even yelled at Aaron that when he was grown up and 6 ft 4, he would never hurt his mom or sister again. 

In 2015 Gracie starts telling her mom that in addition to physical abuse, Aaron had been sexually assaulting her. When she was 6, which was right after Aaron got custody, he started molesting her. And then when she was 11 he began raping her.  As the kids get older, Angie gets a little more visitation and its occasionally not supervised On one of these occasions Angie takes the kids into a neighboring county to try and get help for them. Aaron finds out and has her arrested since she wasn’t supposed to take the kids out of the county according to her visitation rights. She’s in jail for 3 days, which she says were the scariest days of her life. I think its notable that she says jail was the worst time in her life, not living with Aaron and his constant abuse and even attempted murder. 

Aaron and the judge tell her that if she tells anyone about the sexual abuse they will keep her in jail for at least 30 days. And somehow, I don’t really understand, but the 27 days she didn’t serve were like reserved? So Aaron had her thrown in jail another 2 times. 

During all of this, Grant would go to his friend’s house and his friend’s mom would try and help him.  She would kind of mother him and they knew his home life was bad but not the extent of the abuse. Also kids at school knew about the abuse and that Grant and Gracie were afraid of their dad and didn’t want to go home. Multiple friends told the headmaster of their private school about it. Gracie and Grant told him too. And Tennessee is a mandated reporting state so he should have reported it. The headmaster Robbie Mason likes to brag that he met his wife when she was 15 and he was coaching her basketball team.  So he’s obviously a real stand up guy anyway. 

So I had mentioned earlier that their school was actually affiliated with their church. Or rather cult. Grace Chapel is a fundamentalist church. They raise their daughters to be meek, submissive, and to cater to their husband’s every demands. Angie’s parents who had tried to have her committed, attended a similar church and Angie was raised in that environment. The church covers up accusations of sexual abuse by gaslighting the victims and providing refuge for the abusers. Angie’s father had said that Aaron could do anything he wanted with Angie, even hit her. 

The founding pastor of Grace Chapel, Steve Berger, gave a sermon called “Biblical Qualifications for bringing an accusation against someone” in which he said that there must be multiple witnesses, such as other people, fingerprints, or DNA in order for the accusation to be valid. So in the times of the metoo movement those accusations weren’t biblical since there weren’t any witnesses. Since sexual assult is not usually performed in front of a crowd of witnesses, those rape accusations are invalid.  He stepped down from his position in early 2021 and denied that it had anything to do with the backlash he had received from attending the Jan 6th, capital riot because of course he’s a Trump supporter. 

Grace Chapel has some very prominent members like the Tennessee governor Bill Lee, Senator Jack Johnson and his wife Judge  Deanna Johnson, remember her name for just a minute. Also the judge who had presided over the divorce and visitation case and threw Angie in jail was also a church member. 

They have a court date in Sept 2018. Grant feels like the judge will rule in their favor because of things he said to him. He also has a friend with him who wanted to speak and back up their claims of abuse. The judge refuses to let him speak and denies the kids request to live with their mom.  The kids can’t handle the constant abuse and they run away and go to their mom’s house shortly after. When Gracie takes the stand to talk about her abuse, Aaron’s attorney, Scott Parsley tries to intimidate her and gaslight her very similarly to the way her father has treated her.

In Jan of 2019, Angie and Aaron are in court again.  Who did I tell you to remember? This time they are in front of Judge Deanna Johnson. The Senator’s wife and fellow Grace Chapel member. She accuses Angie of harassing Aaron and tells her her claims of abuse are without merit and bars her from filing any civil cases against Aaron for 6 years which coincidentally will be after Gracie is 18. How the is that legal? Also she refused to listen to 3 different mental health professionals who all said Angie was very sane and actually had PTSD thanks to the years of torment from Aaron. 

Also sometime in 2019- 2020 Aaron goes and buys burial plots for himself, the kids, AND Angie.

June 13, 2020 Grant turns 18. He’s living with his mom and tells Gracie that now that he’s 18, he’s going to go to court and get custody of her so she’ll finally be free of Aaron. She’s 13 at the time. 

July 20, Grant has pitching practice. Aaron is meeting him at the field.  7:37am Grant leaves the house. He calls his mom at 751 and tells her his plans to go out with his girlfriend after baseball. That was the last time Angie spoke to him. 

According to life 360 Grant arrived at the field between 8:27 and 8:41am. 

According to Aaron, the only witness, Grant parked his truck and went to get his baseball gear out of the bed when it rolled backwards, dragged him across the pavement, down a hill, and into a ditch. 

Aaron said he was packed next to him and was sitting in his car checking work emails when he realized what happened. Aaron calls 911 at 844am. Grant was taken by ambulance from the scene and pronounced dead at 928 am. 

In Aaron’s 911 call recording he says “I got 3 guys here and he’s trapped under the truck” Those 3 guys are not identified and when police arrive they are unable to find any other witnesses besides Aaron.  Grant was diagnosed as being in cardiac arrest with blunt force trauma to the back of the head and a traumatic brain injury. 

For Gracie and Angie, Aaron’s account of what happened never made any sense. Grant never kept his gear in the bed of the truck but in the backseat on the driver’s side. Why would he be behind the truck? How did Aaron not hear him scream or cry for help? Family and friends say Grant always contacted his girlfriend when he got to a new location before he got out of his truck. No one can explain why he didn’t that day. Also where is his phone? 

A week later when Aaron is explaining to Angie what happened,  which was being recorded, he said Grant was getting his stuff out of the backseat. Angie was shocked to see the condition of her son’s body Remember she’s a doctor. It was intact with very little injury. Hospital staff recorded a bleeding wound on his skull and 3 bruises one on his jaw, one near his left hip and the other on his right thigh. Where were the injuries from being dragged down a hill, where are the injuries from the rocks, from being under the hot car? No fractures, punctures, bleeding, or any other wounds besides the bruises. 

Although Angie requested an investigation, the cops took Aaron’s statement and promptly closed the case.  Before Angie could get to the hospital, Aaron refused an autopsy, any post mortem inspection or organ donation. Aaron also refused to have the truck investigated to see if there was something faulty. 

Today Gracie is 14 years old. On May 12, 2021 an anonymous account called Freedom for Gracie, posted an 18 min video to YouTube. Here is the link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bpNRNuaFhAk

In it Gracie talks in detail about the sexual abuse and the various ways Aaron controlled them and terrorized their family.  Even though she has a temporary restraining order against him, he shows up at Gracie’s school whenever he wants and no one prevents him from coming on the property. In the video Gracie says she thinks her dad killed Grant to keep him from going to court and that she fears for her life.  

A week after the video is uploaded, Aaron files a suit against Angie and 20+ other people including friends of Grant’s for having a smear campaign against him.  And 2 weeks later DCS finally removed Gracie and placed her in foster care.  Aaron is still her custodial parent and hasn’t been charged in any of the crimes that he has been accused of.