******* Co. officials: Retired racecar driver dies Thursday

******* COUNTY, N.C. —

Retired racecar driver Richard "Dick" Trickle, 71, died Thursday from an apparent self-inflicted gunshot wound, according to ******* County officials.

The shooting occurred at 12:02 p.m. at Forest Lawn Cemetery on Highway 150 East in Boger City.

The ******* County Communications Center received a call, apparently from Trickle, that "there would be a dead body and it would be his." Communications Center workers tried to place a return call to the number but did not get an answer.

The first emergency units arriving at the scene found the body lying near Trickle's pickup truck.

Trickle's granddaughter, Nicole Ann Bowman, is buried in the cemetery. She died in 2001 at age 16 in a car wreck.

Trickle was a ******* County resident and had lived here since the early 1990s.