McMinn County Sheriff Joe Guy received a check Wednesday from Cleveland and Bradley County leaders who organized a reward fund that led to the apprehension, arrest and conviction of individuals in the assault on a busload of Lee University students in 2010.

Three suspects were taken into custody after a heavy fan motor was tossed from an overpass on Interstate 75 in McMinn County, striking the bus.

Seventeen members of Lee University’s Voices of Lee were returning from a singing engagement in Chambersburg, Pa.

McMinn County Sheriff’s Office detectives launched an investigation and officials in Cleveland organized the reward offering for information leading to the arrests.

The fund quickly grew to $13,500.

Jeremy Michael Mulkey, 20, Barry William Burbank, 21, and Casey Shane Thomas, 20, were arrested Dec. 29, 2010, and charged in the Lee bus incident.

The three were also charged in Bradley County for vandalism over $60,000 for damaging heavy equipment owned by Wright Brothers Construction at the new Cleveland airport construction site.

Mulkey was sentenced to four years and was taken into custody by the Tennessee Department of Corrections. Thomas was also sentenced to four years in TDOC custody after a guilty plea. Burbank has not been sentenced, according to Guy.

Contributors to the reward fund included Check into Cash, the Cleveland Daily Banner, state Reps. Kevin Brooks and Eric Watson, state Sen. Mike Bell, John Fogerty, Cleveland Mayor Tom and Sandra Rowland, Bank of Cleveland, Tarver Distributing, Lee University, Pioneer Credit, Athens Federal Bank and the 10th Judicial Drug Task Force.

“The reward was very beneficial,” Guy said. “It generated more talk about the incident which endangered so many people.”

He added, “This demanded more attention for getting information in solving the case. The reward money will be given to the person who gave critical information.”