Wilson County Sheriff’s detectives arrested Jeaneen Boyas on August 20 and charged her with first-degree murder after Robert Mallen, 64, died from a gunshot wound following an incident at Cherokee Marina in Lebanon, Tennessee on August 14. Boyas is being held in the Wilson County Jail on $500,000 bond.
Investigators haven’t publicly detailed the relationship between Boyas and Mallen or what led up to the shooting at the marina. The six days between the incident and the arrest suggest detectives spent that time building the case before filing charges, which is typical in homicide investigations where the immediate cause of death is clear but the surrounding circumstances need to be established first.
A Pattern Wilson County Has Seen Before
This is at least the third domestic-violence-connected homicide case in Wilson County within the past year: a Wilson County woman was fatally stabbed during a domestic assault in November 2025, leading to a first-degree murder charge against Rafael Arita-Alberto, and a separate June 2026 case resulted in a criminal homicide charge against Jerry Mathews in what police described as an isolated domestic incident. Three cases in under a year don’t necessarily point to a single cause, but they do reflect a county sheriff’s office that’s had to handle a heavier caseload of these incidents than it typically would.
What’s Next for the Case
Boyas remains in custody on bond pending further court proceedings. First-degree murder in Tennessee requires prosecutors to establish premeditation, meaning the case will likely turn on what evidence detectives gathered about the days and hours leading up to Mallen’s death, not just the shooting itself.
