Dead woman's daughter provides context on mother's, suspect's relationship

The daughter of a murdered Bollinger County woman described her mother as a person who was willing to help anyone, including the man who is alleged to have shot and killed her.

Tina Skaggs died Dec. 17 at her residence off Route Y in Bollinger County.

Terry Allen, 79, was charged with first-degree murder and armed criminal action. He’s accused of shooting Skaggs in the leg, causing her to bleed to death. A probable-cause document filed in the case stated that investigators found blood inside Skaggs’ house, with a trail that led to where she was found, gripping a butcher knife with her right hand.

Terry Allen

Celina Schaut, Skaggs’ daughter, said her mother and Allen were neighbors. She said her mother and their family enjoyed the chestnut orchard that Allen had planted many years ago. She said her mother had rightful access to part of the property where they would collect nuts that had fallen from the trees.

“She was the caretaker of the chestnut orchard,” Schaut said. “She was very into the upkeep of the place. That’s where she lived. That’s where (the murder) happened. It’s a farm. She tried to keep it clean around the orchard and harvested the nuts. We had my reception there in the fall of 2021.”

The property appears to be at the heart of ongoing neighbor disputes. Schaut said she knew of some ongoing neighborly feuds, but she wasn’t aware of anything so serious that she believed Allen would shoot her mother. Her perception was that ongoing spats were trivial issues. Skaggs, 53, the mother of three children, had lived on the property for about five years. At the beginning of that time, Allen owned the property where both homes were located, she said, but Allen sold the property to a man in St. Louis on the condition that he could continue to live there until his death. Schaut said her mother rented her home from the same man in St. Louis.

The probable-cause documented noted that days before Skaggs was shot and killed, Allen had contacted the sheriff’s office saying that Skaggs’ son had stolen something from his property. Schaut said she doesn’t believe that anything was stolen, but her mother often warned them to not spill over onto Allen’s area of the property to harvest the chestnuts. During that November interview with police, Allen is reported to have told a deputy that the next time he saw her son on his property, Allen would shoot him. The officer, according to the probable-cause statement, told Allen he could not shoot someone for walking onto his property. Allen allegedly further told police that he would be allowed to shoot someone in the leg, citing statements President Joe Biden had made regarding deadly police shootings. Police say when told he would face prison time, Allen noted he was an old man, anyway, and that prison time didn’t matter.

“Terry is the one who planted the orchard,” Schaut said. “When we were out there walking around and just picking up the nuts, we talked about the care Terry had in planting the trees. I didn’t know him (well) but I was kind of fond of him, because me and mom admired the chestnut farm, and the way he planted them, they were beautiful. And if not for him, those trees wouldn’t have been there.”

She added that the relationship between her mother and Allen had never been romantic, but it wasn’t always frictional.

She said he had paid her mother to paint his front porch and, for a time, to clean his house. She said her mother was a good friend who would help people, including her neighbor.

“He attended church with her on a couple of occasions,” she said. “A few times, she would be offering him dinner or just visiting.”

She said she had the perception that Allen was a lonely man. She said she doesn’t know how things took such a bad turn that Allen would shoot her mother.