James Hardy Coffey was a deputy sheriff in Avery Co., NC when he was shot and killed on Sunday, Apr 5, 1936 by his nephew, Ernest Reid Coffey, the son of John Wesley, James' brother. Hardy suspected the nephew of breaking into summer camps around the county. On the night of his death he completed his tour of duty and had just returned home when a shotgun blast through a window fatally wounded Hardy. The nephew was sentenced to death in the NC gas chamber but that was commuted to life by the then NC governor. Many in the family believe that it was not Reid who killed James, but Reid's father, John Wesley Coffey.

In a footnote to his book Until He Is Dead: Capital Punishment in Western North Carolina History, [Parkway Publishers, Boone, North Carolina, 2003] James Thomas Rusher wrote that Reid Coffey always maintained his innocence. "Boyd Coffey, another nephew, stated the same. Several of the Coffey collateral descendants, without exception, said Reid Coffey was innocent. Boyd Coffey once asked his Uncle Reid directly about the murder of Hardy Coffey, and Reid's response was that he did not murder Hardy Coffey, but someday, Reid would tell his nephew all about the crime. Boyd Coffey was with his uncle when Reid Coffey died. Immediate family members of Reid Coffey are all dead, but the current generation of Coffeys maintains that Reid Coffey did not commit the murder, but rather another member of the immediate family did. This other male person was allegedly motivated by altogether different reason to murder Hardy Coffey. There is no way to prove or disprove this theory."

Note: Ernest's death sentence was commuted to life by then Gov. Hoey on Aug. 4, 1937 and in 1940 that sentence was reduced by Gov. Hoey to "20 to 30 years." In 1948 he was given parole and was ultimately pardoned by the Governor of North Carolina.