10/11/2025
Ted and Joanna Chavis Dead at the Hands of Foster Child
The foster system has always been a gamble both for foster kids and foster parents. Foster kids do not know if they are going to a good home, and foster parents do not know the kind of kid entering their home.
Unfortunately, a tragedy struck a North Carolina couple who fostered a teenage boy at the time of their deaths.
The Family’s Deaths
53-year-old Ted Matthew Chavis and 46-year-old Joann Nicole Chavis lived in Red Springs, North Carolina, in Hoke County. They had a 17-year-old foster son, only known as D.P.
On Monday, October 27, 2025, a cardiac arrest call came in at 6 p.m., and Hoke County Sheriff’s Department deputies responded. But when they arrived, they learned that this scene was anything but a cardiac arrest.
The deputies found two unresponsive people, Ted and Joann, who had multiple stab wounds and were sadly dead. Almost immediately, D.P. was named a suspect in his foster parents’ deaths.
Law enforcement officers found D.P. hours later, but they could not have anticipated the outcome.
Finding D.P.
Later that night, on October 27, the authorities tracked D.P.’s car fifty miles away from the crime scene, about an hour southeast in Columbus County, specifically in Lake Waccamaw. The vehicle was found near a Boys and Girls Homes campus.
D.P. was not in the car, so officers had the campus put on lockdown. The Lake Waccamaw Police Department, the Hoke County Sheriff’s Office, and the Whiteville Fire Department’s Drone Team worked together to secure and search the area to ensure there was no immediate threat. Law enforcement personnel cleared the occupied buildings before moving onto the unoccupied areas.
When the authorities arrived at one of the unoccupied areas, they found D.P. The officers approached him, and he died by su***de via a self-inflicted gunshot wound. First responders provided D.P. aid and took him to the hospital, where he was pronounced dead.
Community Response
Even after what happened to Joann and Ted, Gaile Osborne of Foster Family Alliance of NC told WRAL News, “I don't want our families that are currently serving children to panic. I don't want them to think 'oh, the child in my home is going to do the same thing to me.' This is not a typical response. This is absolutely not normal.”
Hoke County Sheriff Roderick Virgil told ABC 11, “Our community is built on strength, compassion, and unity. Healing will take time, but through unity and faith, we will find strength once again.”
D.P.’s death is currently under investigation, and so are Joann and Ted’s deaths.
Written by: Rachel Borchers
Social Media Contributing Writer
