Kyle Green | The Roanoke Times

Randall Lee Smith, 54, of Pearisburg, is taken Friday by Giles County officers to a Roanoke magistrate.

Kyle Green | The Roanoke Times

Randall Lee Smith faces two counts of attempted capital murder, grand larceny and other charges.

Randall Lee Smith was released from Carilion Roanoke Memorial Hospital on Friday afternoon and taken, in police custody, before a Roanoke magistrate, officials said.

Earlier in the day, police charged him with two counts of attempted capital murder, two counts of using a firearm in commission of a felony, possession of a firearm by a felon and grand larceny, according to Lt. Ron Hamlin of the Giles County Sheriff's Office.

Smith, 54, of Pearisburg, was apprehended Tuesday night after he crashed a pickup truck that belonged to one of two fishermen shot earlier that night in the Dismal Creek area of Giles County. Smith, injured in the crash, was hospitalized in Roanoke after being taken into custody as a suspect in the shootings. Doctors placed him on a ventilator until sometime Thursday, Hamlin said.

The site of Tuesday's shootings was not far from the area where, in 1981, Smith killed Susan Ramsay and Robert Mountford Jr., both 27, after encountering them on the Appalachian Trail. Smith served 15 years in prison for the killings and was released in 1996.

The victims in Tuesday's shootings -- Sean Farmer, 33, of Tazewell and Scott Johnston, 37, of Bluefield -- also were taken to Roanoke Memorial.

Farmer, who was shot in the face and chest, had been released by Wednesday, friends said.

Johnston was shot in the neck and back. He was listed in good condition, according to hospital spokesman Eric Earnhart.

Friday afternoon, Carilion police officers, who held jurisdiction over Smith, served him with the warrants for his arrest, and Giles County officers advised him of his Miranda rights, Hamlin said.

Smith was then taken, in a wheelchair, to a Giles County police cruiser waiting at a service entrance for the Carilion Police Department in the north wing of the building. About 5:15 p.m., the cruiser, led by an unmarked Giles County sport utility vehicle and followed by a Carilion police vehicle, turned onto Belleview Avenue Southeast bound for the jail.

Smith, looking frail and disheveled, slouched in the cruiser's back seat. He wore what appeared to be a hospital gown and had a white pillow near him. The beard he was shown wearing in a recently circulated photograph has been shaved off, and there were red scrapes on his face and left temple.

About 5:30 p.m., the three vehicles arrived at the Roanoke City Jail where, because of Smith's health condition, the magistrate came out to the car for the hearing.

"It's hard to get him [Smith] in and out of the cruiser," Hamlin said, citing a back brace Smith was wearing. "He's doing pretty good.

"He's understood everything we've said to him."

Hamlin said the magistrate ordered Smith held without bond, and the suspect was remanded to the custody of the Giles County Sheriff's Office. By 6 p.m., he was headed back to Giles County for questioning, but Hamlin said he expected Smith would be booked into the New River Valley Regional Jail sometime Friday night.

No date has been set for hearings in Giles County court.

Staff writers Shawna Morrison and Jessica Marcy contributed to this report.