Hours later, both men got into an argument at the business
In the hours after a North Carolina judge ordered him to honor a $310,882 settlement, 85-year-old furniture manufacturer Willard Gary Black allegedly turned a years-long financial grievance into an act of fatal violence, shooting his business partner Robert Roger Arguelles at the company they shared. Arguelles, 59, a school board member and family man, had won his legal battle only to lose his life the same afternoon. The case is a somber reminder that unresolved conflict between people bound by money and trust can reach a point where the law's resolution arrives too late to prevent the worst.
- A judge's binding order to pay over $310,000 transformed a simmering financial dispute into a crisis Black apparently refused to accept.
- Within hours of the ruling, an argument at the Old Hickory Tannery escalated until Black produced a firearm and shot Arguelles in the chest and back.
- Arguelles, who had served his community on the Alexander County Schools board since 2022, was pronounced dead at the scene despite police efforts to intervene.
- Black, now 85, is in custody facing a second-degree murder charge as the criminal justice system takes over where the civil courts left off.
- The district superintendent mourned Arguelles as a devoted father, husband, and faithful public servant — a life far larger than the contract dispute that ended it.
On a Wednesday afternoon in North Carolina, a judge ordered Willard Gary Black to pay his business partner $310,882.74 — the binding conclusion to a dispute that had been building since 2018, when Black sold Robert Roger Arguelles a 49.9% stake in their furniture manufacturing company. Arguelles had claimed Black borrowed $280,000 from him and repaid only a fraction of it. The two men had agreed to settle, filed the paperwork, and then Black tried to walk away from the deal. The judge refused to let him.
Hours after that ruling, the two men argued at the Old Hickory Tannery. The confrontation turned deadly. Black fired a gun; Arguelles, 59, was struck in the chest and back and was pronounced dead at the scene. Black, 85, has since been charged with second-degree murder.
Beyond the business, Arguelles had served on the Alexander County Schools board since 2022. Superintendent Bill Griffin remembered him as an devoted father, husband, and board member who had faithfully supported the school system for nearly four years. The district asked that the family's privacy be respected in the wake of the tragedy.
The case now moves through the criminal courts, but its human outline is painfully clear: a partnership corroded by debt, a legal system that reached a verdict, and a man who chose violence over acceptance — leaving behind a community that had known Arguelles not as a litigant, but as a neighbor.
On a Wednesday afternoon in North Carolina, a judge signed an order requiring Willard Gary Black to pay his business partner $310,882.74. Hours later, Robert Roger Arguelles was dead, shot in the chest and back at the Old Hickory Tannery, the furniture manufacturing company the two men owned together. Black, 85, has been charged with second-degree murder.
The killing was the violent conclusion to a financial dispute that had been building for years. In 2018, Black had sold Arguelles a 49.9% stake in the business. But Arguelles claimed that Black had borrowed $280,000 from him and repaid only $23,876.19 of it. The two men eventually agreed to settle the matter: Black would pay Arguelles $310,882.74 to make things whole. They filed the paperwork with the court. Then Black changed his mind and asked the judge to let him out of the deal.
The judge said no. On Wednesday, the court denied Black's request to withdraw from the settlement agreement and ordered him to pay the full amount. It was a legal defeat, a financial obligation suddenly made binding and real. Arguelles, 59, had won.
What happened next unfolded at the business itself. The two men argued. The argument escalated. At some point, Black had a gun. He fired it. Arguelles fell. Police arrived and tried to save him, but he was pronounced dead at the scene, his body bearing wounds to the chest and back.
Arguelles had a life beyond the furniture business. Since 2022, he had served on the Alexander County Schools board. His colleagues there remembered him as devoted—a father, a husband, someone who showed up for the school system with consistency and care. Bill Griffin, the district superintendent, released a statement describing Arguelles as an "amazing father, husband, and board member who has faithfully supported our school system for almost four years." The district said it would respect the family's privacy as they processed what had happened.
Black remains in custody, charged with second-degree murder. The case sits now in the machinery of the criminal justice system, but the immediate facts are stark: a business partnership fractured by money, a court ruling that went one way, and a man who did not accept that outcome. Arguelles paid the ultimate price for a dispute that should have ended in a courtroom.
Citações Notáveis
An amazing father, husband, and board member who has faithfully supported our school system for almost four years.— Bill Griffin, District Superintendent, describing Robert Roger Arguelles
A Conversa do Hearth Outra perspectiva sobre a história
What made this particular dispute so volatile? They'd been partners for years.
The money was real—$280,000 loaned and mostly never returned. But I think what broke it was the moment Black tried to back out of the settlement. He'd already agreed to pay. The court just made it official. That's when it became irreversible.
So the killing happened the same day the judge ruled against him?
Hours after. That's the timeline that matters. Black had time to sit with the loss, to feel the weight of it, and then he saw Arguelles at the business. Whatever happened between them at that moment, it ended in gunfire.
Did anyone see it coming? Any warning signs?
Not that we know of. Arguelles was a school board member, respected in his community. Black was an 85-year-old business owner. On paper, this looks like two men in a financial dispute. But something in Black broke when the court said no.
What happens to the business now?
That's an open question. The Old Hickory Tannery exists, but one partner is dead and the other is facing murder charges. The business itself may not survive this.