Marietta Police are searching for a vehicle in connection with a shooting incident Sunday night at Andretti Indoor Karting on Roswell Road.
Marietta Police published surveillance camera photos of a car they say drove away from the venue at 1255 Roswell Road after 7 p.m. Sunday.
According to a police statement, a group of individuals got out of a black 2018 Honda Accord around 7:10 p.m. at the Andretti parking lot.
One of the suspects pointed a gun at a man who was walking to his car and demanded jewelry and money, police said.
The victim refused, according to police, who said the suspect fired at least two rounds, but did not hit anyone.
Marietta police said one of its officers arrived at the scene a minute later in a marked police vehicle to begin a part-time shift as a security officer.
At that point, police said, the suspects fled in the Honda. Police said nobody inside was injured.
Police said they don’t have any descriptions of the victims for now, but the car they’re looking for is damaged on the front passenger side and the front right tire appears to be a spare.
Anyone with information is asked to call the Marietta Police Department, or Crime Stoppers Greater Atlanta at 404-577-8477.
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A Cobb police officer is recovering after being shot in the head in a carjacking incident on Powers Ferry Road Thursday night in which the suspect also was killed, according to the Georgia Bureau of Investigation.
The GBI said Friday morning that the incident began around 7:30 p.m. Thursday when Cobb Police were asked by Atlanta Police to check the parking lot of the Publix at 2900 Delk Road, at Powers Ferry Road, for a stolen vehicle.
When Cobb Police arrived, they were told by a citizen that his car had just been carjacked, got a description and found the vehicle nearby, according to the GBI.
When officers tried to stop the vehicle, the vehicle fled and police pursued, the GBI said.
Police learned that the suspect inside the vehicle had a rifle and as the pursuit reached Powers Ferry Road and Riverbend Club Drive, the suspect jumped out of the vehicle and shot several times at police, hitting a police car, the GBI said.
The GBI said the suspect then fled on foot along the Chattahoochee River with the rifle and was found near a dumpster in the Cumberland Chase townhome complex. The GBI said the suspect was given multiple commands by police and did not respond, and the man then fired his rifle at officers, hitting one of them in the head.
The GBI said police returned fire and shot the suspect, who died at the scene.
The suspect was identified as Martin Humberto Sanchez Fregoso, 37, of Smyrna. The GBI said the officer who was shot was treated and released from a hospital.
The GBI is continuing to investigate, as it does in officer-involved shootings.
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Cobb Sheriff’s Office records indicate that Colin William Outz, of an address in the Princeton Lakes subdivision, was booked in the Cobb County Adult Detention Center on Wednesday afternoon and was released a few hours later on a $22,000 bond.
He’s facing one felony count of vehicular homicide and a misdemeanor count of reckless driving, according to jail records.
Outz was identified by Cobb Police as the driver of a Mercedes C300 that struck another Mercedes, at Johnson Ferry Road and Powers Drive around 11:30 p.m. on Feb. 22.
The other Mercedes, driven by Robert Higginbotham of East Cobb, was attempting to turn left onto Powers Drive when it was hit by Outz’ car, which police said was heading southbound on Johnson Ferry in excess of 90 mph.
The posted speed limit in that part of Johnson Ferry Road is 40 mph.
Police said Higginbotham, who lived near the crash scene on Green Point Way, was ejected from his car and was pronounced dead at the scene.
Outz was treated at WellStar Kennestone Hospital with non-life-threatening injuries, according to police.
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Director Kimberly McCoy (front) and Victim Advocate Adriene Grey assembling the kid kits.
Submitted information and photos:
Cobb District Attorney Joyette M. Holmes announces that her office is distributing 250 “kid kits” in a further effort to raise awareness of National Crime Victims’ Rights Week. The event is usually marked each April but has been extended this year due to health concerns.
Earlier this year, the Cobb DA’s Office received $5,000 in funding from the National Association of VOCA Assistance Administrators (NAVAA) through a grant from the Office for Victims of Crime (OVC), within the Office of Justice Programs, U.S. Department of Justice, to promote community awareness of crime victims’ rights and services during the 2020 National Crime Victims’ Rights Week.
Some of those funds were used to purchase items for the kid kits, which include a pencil pouch, coloring book, crayons, and hand sanitizer. The kits include contact information for the Victim Witness Unit of the Cobb DA’s Office.
The kid kits are being distributed through Cobb and Marietta City School districts, and at Cobb Fire Stations.
First designated by President Ronald Reagan in 1981, National Crime Victims’ Rights Week increases general public awareness of and knowledge about the wide range of rights and services available to people who have been victimized by crime. The 2020 theme is “Seek Justice, Ensure Victims’ Rights, and Inspire Hope.”
Since 2004, the NCVRW Community Awareness Project has provided financial and technical assistance to more than 977 community projects that promote victim and public awareness activities, and innovative approaches to victim outreach and public education about victims’ rights and services during National Crime Victims’ Rights Week. Cobb’s was one of the 109 recommended by NAVAA and selected for funding by OVC for 2020 from the 262 applications that were submitted nationwide.
For additional information about 2020 National Crime Victims’ Rights Week activities or about victims’ rights and services in Cobb County, please contact the Victim Witness Unit in the DA’s Office at 770-528-3047 or visit our website at www.cobbda.com.
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The Cobb Police Department issued a statement Saturday night with the Marietta Police Department and the Smyrna Police Department about planned protests in the county stemming from the death of a black man in police custody in Minnesota earlier this week.
The death of George Floyd, who was shown face down on the ground handcuffed, with a white officer kneeling on his neck for nearly 10 minutes, sparked violent protests in several major cities, including Minneapolis, where the incident took place.
Several nights of protests in that city included burning property and police cars, vandalizing stores and storming a police precinct.
Atlanta was the scene of protests Friday night that included vandalizing and looting CNN Center and other businesses in Centennial Olympic Park and in Buckhead.
On Saturday, Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms imposed a curfew that began at 9 p.m. and expires at sunrise Sunday and Georgia National Guard troops have been called in. Similar curfews have been ordered in other cities.
In the joint statement, the three police departments said this about possible protests in Cobb County:
“We have been in contact with a few individuals representing groups that are planning peaceful protests within our jurisdictions. Some of the organizers have expressed concern that outside agitators may try to hijack their plans for a peaceful event. Therefore we recommend anyone else planning protests to communicate and partner with their local law enforcement agencies to maintain the safety of all involved.”
The statement didn’t specify where and when any protests may take place.
East Cobb News has asked Cobb Police if any protests are planned in its jurisdiction and will update that when/if we hear back.
The Cobb police departments said they cannot discuss with the media or the public how they’re preparing for possible violence:
“We have plans in place and we want to remind any who plan to use the peaceful protests as a means to break the law, we will be ready to protect peaceful protestors, residents, and business owners and to arrest and charge any and all who break the law within our respective jurisdictions.”
They urged anyone seeing criminal activity to call 911. “Rest assured, all three departments are and remain passionate about protecting our residents and business owners. Any criminal acts will result in arrest and prosecution according to the law.”
The four Minneapolis officers on the scene at the time of Floyd’s death were terminated, and the officer seen kneeling on the victim was charged with third-degree murder. It’s the latest in a series of deaths of black men by police in recent years that have resulted in protests around the country.
But little has been as violent as what’s taken place this week.
In Brunswick, in south Georgia, three men, including a former investigator with the Glynn County District Attorney’s Office, have been charged with the murder of Ahmaud Arbery, a black man who was jogging in a neighborhood when he was killed in February.
Cobb District Attorney Joyette Holmes has been appointed to take over the prosecution of the case that, like the George Floyd case, took on national importance when video footage emerged.
Among the violent episodes Saturday include police deploying tear gas near the White House to stave off protestors in Washington, D.C., and demonstrators setting City Hall on fire in Nashville. On Friday, two police officers were shot in Oakland, Calif., one of them fatally.
Protestors appeared near the Georgia governor’s mansion in Atlanta Saturday but were dispersed by police before the curfew began.
The Cobb police departments also said this Saturday night:
“For the record, all three of our departments remain strongly opposed to any form of injustice, racism, or brutality. We are deeply concerned and have taken steps to not only protect everyone’s first amendment right to free speech and peaceful protest, but also to protect the life and liberty of our local citizens as well. Our three departments are working in conjunction to make sure the safety of everyone is maintained.”
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The GBI identified the suspect as Jeffery Thomas Moore, 22, of Woodstock.
According to a release the agency issued late Sunday afternoon, after the attack on a Publix employee, Moore was found by Cobb Police officers hiding in a yard at a residence on Bedell Road, near the supermarket shopping center.
Officers attempted to take him into custody using a taser after he resisted arrest, according to the GBI, which said that Moore was then shot by an officer.
The GBI said Moore got away from police and was apprehended in a heavily wooded area. The officer who was attacked has been released from the hospital.
Morris was previously taken to Wellstar Kennestone and later was booked into the Cobb County Adult Detention Center on a felony charge of willful obstruction of a police officer and two misdemeanor charges each of simple assault and simple battery.
He was being detained on $5,000 bail.
The GBI said once its investigation is complete it will turn over its findings to the Cobb County District Attorney’s Office.
ORIGINAL REPORT
Cobb Police said an officer shot a man they said was physically attacking employees of an East Cobb Publix store as they arrived for work Sunday morning.
In a release issued by Sgt. Wayne Delk, Cobb Police Public Information Officer, police were called to the scene at the Publix at 4750 Alabama Road around 7 a.m. Sunday. By the time officers arrived, according to Delk, the man had left the scene, but additional calls came from around the area of someone attacking people in nearby parking lots.
Police said officers located the suspect and he attacked them, injuring an officer. The man then fled on foot as they pursued him into a residential neighborhood, according to police.
Delk said there was a second confrontation between officers and the man in the neighbornood, during which an officer shot the man. However, according to police, the man was able to get away.
Delk said that following a search between officers from Cobb Police Precincts 4 and 1, Roswell Police, the Georgia State Patrol and the Cherokee Sheriff’s Office, the suspect was taken into custody and sent to Wellstar Kennestone Hospital, where he was treated with a non-life-threatening gunshot wound below the waist.
Delk also said the officer who was attacked also was taken to Kennestone for a leg injury.
The suspect was not identified.
The area is near the Cobb-Fulton line, and close to the City of Roswell and the Sandy Plains Village shopping center, between Sandy Plains Road and Mabry Road in Northeast Cobb.
Because this is a officer-involved shooting, Cobb Police are not releasing further details. The case will be investigated by the Georgia Department of Investigation, according to Delk.
The GBI has not yet sent out any further information.
This story will be updated.
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Cobb District Attorney Joyette M. Holmes asks community members to help provide hope to Livesafe Resources by stocking the shelves for victims of domestic violence, as part of National Crime Victims’ Rights Week.
While pandemic precautions have strained our community and locked many into violent homes, Marietta-based liveSAFE Resources remains at work, caring for domestic-violence survivors and performing sexual-assault exams.
Help is available for anyone suffering abuse in an intimate relationship. liveSAFE Resources’ 24-hour crisis line is 770-427-3390, and they are on the web at www.livesaferesources.org
This ‘Stock the Shelves’ event is hosted by the Cobb DA’s Office as part of National Crime Victims’ Rights Week. Events have been extended and moved online this year as a result of current health guidelines.
First designated by President Ronald Reagan in 1981, National Crime Victims’ Rights Week increases general public awareness of, and knowledge about the wide range of rights and services available to people who have been victimized by crime. The theme for 2020 National Crime Victims’ Rights Week is “Seek Justice, Ensure Victims’ Rights, and Inspire Hope.”
For additional information about 2020 National Crime Victims’ Rights Week activities or about victims’ rights and services in Cobb County, please contact the Victim Witness Unit in the DA’s Office at 770-528-3047 or visit our website at www.cobbda.com.
For information about national efforts to promote 2020 National Crime Victims’ Rights Week, please visit the Office for Victims of Crime website at www.ovc.gov.
The National Association of VOCA Assistance Administrators is a non-profit organization that represents the 56 state agencies that distribute money from the federal Victims of Crime Act (VOCA) Crime Victims Fund to more than 4,000 direct victim assistance service providers. The money in the Crime Victims Fund comes from fines collected from offenders convicted of federal crimes and not from U.S. taxpayers.
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Cobb Police said Wednesday that they’re making some policy changes as county government goes into “limited operations status” due to the Coronavirus outbreak.
A release issued by Cobb Police said that while they’ll still respond to calls from the public that require the presence of officers, those that don’t will be addressed on a case-by-case basis.
“In such cases residents may, after making an initial 911 call, get a call back from a police supervisor or an officer to make a report over the phone,” Cobb Police spokesman Sgt. Wayne Delk said in the release.
He also said the police department’s record’s office will be open Monday-Friday from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. at headquarters (140 North Marietta Parkway, Marietta).
The lobby also will stay open, but citizens are asked that if they need to get copies of accident or incident reports to use the department’s website or call 770-499-3900 between 8 a.m. and 5 p.m. Monday-Friday.
The department’s permit office is closed until further notice, and anyone wishing to or eligible to obtain an employment permit cannot get one until it reopens. Information is available by clicking here or by calling 770-499-3932 Monday-Friday from 8:30 a.m. to 4 p.m.
Also closed is the Cobb Police evidence unit, which will reopen on April 7. For any items that may be needed due to an emergency (medication, currency, house/car keys, etc.) the number to call is 770-499-4128 Monday-Friday from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m.
In Precinct 4, two Cobb Police Coffee With a Cop sessions have been cancelled: Thursday at the Janice Overbeck Real Estate office, and on March 26 at The Art Place.
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Submitted information about several upcoming Cobb Police Coffee With a Cop meetings, where the public is invited to bring questions and discuss crime and public safety issues with Precinct 4 community officer Nathalie Jegg:
Tuesday, February 11, 10:00 AM to noon at IHOP, 3130 Johnson Ferry Road
Tuesday, February 186:00 PM to 8:00 PM at Starbucks, 2424 Roswell Road
Monday, May 4 10:00 AM to noon at Jacobs Java 1350 Terrell Mill Road
Upcoming major/public events for Cobb Police Community Affairs:
Ride with the Blue Charity Motorcycle Ride on Sunday, April 19 at Jim Miller Park time TBA (for more info contact Officer Granell at, Raymond.Granell-Reyes@cobbcounty.org)
Copz, Kidz, & Chicken event at Zaxby’s, 2981 Delk Road, April 22 from 5:00 PM to 8:00 PM. A portion of the proceeds to benefit Brumby Elementary School to pay down outstanding school lunch debts (for more info contact Officer Jegg at Nathalie.Jegg@cobbcounty.org)
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The Cobb District Attorney’s Office said Tuesday it’s been able to close three cold case rape files dating from 1999 using advanced genetic genealogy testing.
But the man identified by Cobb investigators as the suspect died in December, shortly after they took DNA samples from him in Arkansas, where he lived.
Lorinzo Novoa Williams, who was 48, went missing after Cobb investigators, with help from Arkansas law enforcement, executed a search warrant to collect his DNA samples, according to Cobb DA’s office public information officer Kim Isaza.
She said that after they returned home, Cobb investigators were told by their Arkansas counterparts that Williams was later found dead.
Isaza said the rapes took place within a three-mile radius in southeast Cobb between June and October 1999. In each case, the attacks took place during pre-dawn hours, with each woman waking up to find an unknown man standing over her.
She said each victim reported her attack to police, which took a rape kit, and that the DNA profile in all three cases was identical, meaning they were assaulted by the same man.
But the profile didn’t match an offender in the CODIS combined DNA index system at the time, according to Isaza.
Cobb Senior Assistant DA Theresa Schiefer began looking at the cases again in 2018 at the request of a cold case unit, and secured a $10,000 grant from the federal Bureau of Justice Assistance to retest the rape kits with advanced technology, Isaza said.
Early last year, the profile was submitted to a private lab that constructed a genetic tree of the suspect, she said.
From there, the Cobb DA’s office sexual assault investigating unit and its cold case unit discovered the suspect lived in metro Atlanta at the time of the 1999 rapes. He had been arrested on peeping tom, indecent exposure and burglary charges in Cobb and Gwinnett, also during that time.
Isaza said that the Georgia Bureau of Investigation’s Forensic Biology Section determined that the DNA collected from Williams matched the profile of the 1999 rape kits.
Isaza said Schiefer spoke to each of the rape victims after the match was confirmed.
“I feel very fortunate that we could provide some answers to these women after all this time. We want anyone who has experienced sexual assault to know that we will continue to work their cases in hopes that their turn will come, too,” Schiefer said.
According to his obituary, Williams worked for a construction company in Hampton, Ark., and was married with four children. He and his wife became Jehovah’s Witnesses in Macon in 2003.
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Jake Horne was taken off life support after being shot outside an East Cobb home in March; the homeowner, Larry Epstein, was charged with his murder.
A quiet East Cobb neighborhood became the focus of an intense law enforcement presence one afternoon in early March 2019 after two home contractors were shot in what some residents thought was an active shooter situation.
Cobb Police ordered residents to stay inside as they closed off Wellington Lane, off Johnson Ferry Road, and sent in SWAT officers and a mobile command unit.
A nearby resident told East Cobb News she’d never seen so much police concentrated in the area, a situation drawing heavy metro Atlanta media coverage as well.
A resident of Kensington, the neighborhood in question, told East Cobb News that “they have us pretty blocked in but not giving any info. They are in SWAT gear with guns drawn.”
An hour or so after police came to the scene, the standoff ended peacefully when Larry Epstein, a resident of the Wellington Lane home where the shootings occurred, surrendered.
Two electrical contractors doing work at his home were rushed to WellStar Kennestone Hospital.
One of them, Jake Horne, 21, of Kennesaw, was taken off life support and pronounced dead the following morning after being shot in the head. Gordon Montcalm, 37, of Buchanan, Ga., was listed in serious condition and faced a long recovery.
Epstein, 69, was charged with murder and he remains in the Cobb County Adult Detention Center after being denied bond.
During his probable cause hearing, police said Epstein had accused the workers of killing pet ducks at the home, although there was no evidence of those acts.
The families of the victims were left to scramble to raise funds for medical and funeral expenses, and to comprehend what had happened.
“This is a boy that would give you the shirt off of his back. He had a heart of gold,” said Lisa Godsey, Horne’s aunt, who lives in California. “He thought of everyone else before himself.”
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Cobb Police said they’ve arrested Zaire Dhanoolal, 18, of Marietta, on two counts of aggravated assault, and Joweer Ponce, 19, also of Marietta, who’s charged with reckless conduct and carrying a concealed weapon without a permit.
Cobb Police spokeswoman Officer Sydney Melton said both have been taken to the Cobb Adult Detention Center.
She said the person who was shot, Ethan Green, 18, is being treated at WellStar Kennestone Hospital with non-life-threatening injuries.
Melton said Anthony Ezell, 21, was a victim of aggravated assault because the suspect pointed a gun at him before firing at Green.
Police have not indicated a possible motive for the shooting but are continuing to investigate.
Anyone with information is asked to contact the Cobb County Police Department Crimes Against Persons Unit at 770-499-3945
ORIGINAL POST:
Cobb Police said one person was shot at the food court at Cumberland Mall Saturday afternoon, prompting a temporary closing of the shopping center while they’re searching for a suspect.
Police said the victim was taken to a hospital but did not identify the person or disclose the severity of the injuries.
Police they were called at 1:18 p.m. and that out of an abundance of caution initial indications were that it was an active shooter situation, police said.
But police said when they arrived on the scene they determined there was no random shooting, which is what usually triggers an active shooter alert, and said that a dispute led to shots being fired.
The suspect fled the scene, and police did not have a description of the suspect or offer other details.
Law enforcement presence around the mall is heavy and motorists in the area are being asked to use alternate roads.
The Cobb Fire Department said a man and a dog were found dead in a Northeast Cobb home after a fire broke out there on Tuesday morning.
The 46-year-old man has not been identified and the cause of the fire has not been announced. Capt. Joseph Bryant of the Cobb Fire Department said fire and EMS units were called to the home at 2235 Snug Harbor, off Sandy Plains Road, at 8:08 a.m. Tuesday.
That’s in the St. Charles Square subdivision, off Sandy Plains and near Scufflegrit Road.
The man and the dog were found in the master bedroom on the main level of the two-story, home, Bryant said.
He said the cause remains under investigation and foul play is not suspected.
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An East Cobb man who owns vaping and tobacco shops at the East Marietta Shopping Center has been arrested and jailed without bond on drug charges after Marietta Police conducted a raid on his businesses Tuesday.
Marietta Police said Wednesday that Billy Scott Christian, 28, was charged with three felony counts related to the possession, sale and distribution of marijuana and another felony count of possession of a firearm during the commission or attempted commission of a crime.
According to Cobb Sheriff’s Office records, Christian lives at a Yancy Road address, in a neighborhood near Sedalia Park Elementary School.
He is the owner of the Royal Cigar and Tobacco Store at 1514 Roswell Road, and the Endangered Botanicals Shop at 1510 Roswell Road, both in the East Marietta Shopping Center.
Police said during the raid that lab equipment to manufacture gummy edibles and capsules of what may be Kratom (an opiate) were confiscated, along with more than nine pounds of marijuana, multiple scales, baggies and three firearms.
More than 100 pounds of the gummy edibles and possible Kratom capsules were collected at the scene for further testing, according to police. Kratom is a substance with similar effects as heroin.
Marietta Police said in a release that following safety alerts issued by the Centers for Disease Control about deaths relating to vaping and THC oil (the key ingredient in marijuana), they began investigating the sale of hemp and CBD oil in the city.
Samples from Christian’s store were identified by the Georgia Bureau of Investigation as containing THC, not hemp, and Marietta Police said they secured search warrants as a result.
The police release said additional charges may be considered regarding the capsules “once the GBI confirms the actual chemicals” they may contain.
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Cobb District Attorney Joyette M. Holmes announces that the annual Cobb County Candlelight Vigil and Homicide Memorial will be held on Tuesday, Nov. 19 in the Jury Assembly Room of the Cobb Superior Courthouse.
“This Evening of Remembrance pays homage to those who have been lost to violent crime. These victims were – and still are – held dear in someone’s heart,” District Attorney Holmes said. “As we see far too often, the actual victim of a homicide is not the only person the crime hurts. Those left behind suffer, too. We wish to recognize that and let them know that they are also not forgotten.”
Tangela Brooks, who lost her son, Jonathan, 22, to homicide in 2011, will be the guest speaker.
Law enforcement partners from around the county will be joining the District Attorney’s Office staff at the vigil. Kennesaw Police Chief Bill Westenberger, Cobb Police Deputy Chief Stuart Vanhoozer, and Acworth Police Chief Wayne Dennard will read the names of deceased victims during the ceremony.
“This is Cobb County’s second annual Evening of Remembrance. This vigil is important to those families who have suffered the ultimate loss of life due to murder or homicide in Cobb County in that it gives these families a special evening to remember their loved ones,” said Kim McCoy, director of the Victim Witness Unit. “Hosting an event such as this gives us, the service providers, an opportunity to honor those we serve and to remind us of why we do what we do on a daily basis. We are honored to share this event with our community.”
Gathering and refreshments will begin at 6 p.m. The ceremony will begin at 7 p.m.
Attendees may enter the Courthouse at the 70 Haynes Street entrance. Complimentary parking will be available at the Lawrence Street deck.
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A man who was convicted of choking the mother of his baby at her East Cobb home last year has been given a 22-year prison sentence, with 20 to serve.
Derek James Burns, 29, of Carrollton, was sentenced Monday by Cobb Superior Court Judge Adele Grubbs, after a jury convicted him last week of aggravated assault (strangulation), false imprisonment, simple battery and simple assault.
According to the Cobb District Attorney’s Office, Burns, who has been in jail since the April 2018 incident, will get credit for time served.
Prosecutors said at the trial that Burns and the victim were arguing at her home on Bradford Lane, off Barnes Mill Road, on April 19, 2018. According to testimony, Burns put the woman in a chokehold until she lost conscious and control of her bladder.
Prosectors said the woman realized after she regained consciousness that she had been dragged across the floor and placed in a corner, and said that Burns threatened to shoot her if she looked up or raised her head until he was gone, and would “make it look like a suicide.”
Also testifying at the trial was a former girlfriend of Burns, who said he had choked her, also rendering her unconscious, when they were dating.
Grubbs, who said Burns was “vicious and harmful,” also ordered him to serve the final two years of his term on probation.
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A City of East Cobb fire department “will not have the resources to operate” at a top certified level of protection, according to a group opposing cityhood. (ECN file)
A group opposed to East Cobb cityhood is criticizing an independent financial review that concluded that a proposed city would be fiscally viable.
The five-member Independent Financial Group, consisting of East Cobb residents who are finance and legal experts, volunteered to examine a Georgia State University feasibility study and issued its report in September.
The East Cobb Alliance, which formed over the summer to oppose cityhood, said in a posting on its Facebook page over the weekend that “in the beginning, there were 5 people on the IFG, but the 5th guy resigned when he couldn’t stomach the baloney the other 4 were proposing…and, ‘baloney’ is putting it nicely.”
(Shailesh Bettadapur, a member of the IFG group, resigned two days before the report was released, according to Bill Green, another member of the review group.)
The ECA post further stated that “several members of ECA who have choked their way through reading this document consider it nothing but a bunch of mumbo-jumbo malarkey.”
The East Cobb Alliance took issue with the report above all over fire services. The Committee for Cityhood in East Cobb had state legislation introduced in March that would create a city of East Cobb with police, fire and community development services.
The ECA noted in its posting that in the IFG report, members of the review group and the cityhood group “are concerned the [GSU feasibility] Study may not have included all necessary fire protection expenditures.”
The ECA post continued:
“This is a group of 4 people, NONE of whom have ANY experience in the fire protection services world. No one on the GSU research team had ANY experience in fire protection services. No one on the Pro-Cityhood Committee has ANY clue as to what it takes to operate an effective fire department.
“Our County Fire Department, and our personal lives and property, should NOT be subjected to the whims of fools who have NO IDEA of what it takes to assemble, hire, train, OR operate a world-class Fire Department like we have right now.
“Tell your friends and neighbors about this IDIOCY being pushed upon us.”
The GSU feasibility study estimated an annual fire budget of $5.9 million. According to the IFG report (read it here), a city finance director in a nearby municipality said a City of East Cobb may have relatively lower costs for fire because it “has a low proportion of multi-unit residential housing and fewer tall buildings.”
The IFG, in its report, added $4 million for fire expenses estimates “as a placeholder” pending further budgeting information becoming available.
The East Cobb cityhood bill includes a proposed municipality of around 96,000 people, and five fire stations currently part of the Cobb County Fire and Emergency Services Department.
The ECA in recent days has examined other aspects of the cityhood proposal, including the possible purchase and use of the East Cobb Government Services Center on Lower Roswell Road, and the proposed cost of buying those five fire stations for the new city from the county.
The ECA also claims that a new City of East Cobb fire department “will not have the resources” to provide the top certified level of protection, also known as ISO-1. Cobb is one of around 240 fire departments nationwide to have that status, which is given by the Insurance Services Office, a non-profit that provides insurance information, including for fire and building codes.
“Should we kill a great Fire Department to build a new police department? Seems like kind of a weird trade-off,” the ECA asks.
Another topic covers police and jail services that have been proposed by the cityhood group. The GSU feasibility study suggested a 140-officer East Cobb police force, nearly double the number of officers on patrol in Cobb Police Precinct 4, which covers an area well beyond the proposed city lines. Currently Precinct 4 has a staffing of around 50 response officers, a shortage of less than 20 for what it’s been allocated.
“That just seems very bizarre to us when the land area will be half of their current coverage,” concluded the ECA. “Why should we vote to form a new city to correct a deficiency of 16 people . . . when the coverage territory of a new city will be 50% of the original precinct territory? For all we know, 71 people may be the ideal force for a PCEC.”
The East Cobb Alliance and the East Cobb cityhood group have been invited to a Nov. 12 forum hosted by the East Cobb Business Association.
The cityhood group’s public events, which follow town halls in the spring, also tentatively will include more meetings after the first of the year, when the Georgia legislature would take up the East Cobb cityhood bill.
That bill would have to pass the entire General Assembly for a cityhood referendum to take place in 2020.
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A South Georgia man indicted for killing an East Cobb couple in 2015 has had the dismissal of his murder indictment upheld by the Georgia Supreme Court.
By a 7-2 vote, the state’s high court agreed with a lower-court ruling that a Telfair County grand jury that indicted Ronnie Adrian Towns was unlawfully constituted because “some of the grand jurors were not selected randomly.”
Towns was charged with the Jan. 2015 murders of Elrey “Bud” Runion, 69, and his wife June, 66, of East Cobb, who had traveled to McRae, Ga., to buy a 1966 Ford Mustang Towns had posted for sale on Craigslist.
After their daughters reported them missing, the bodies of the Runions were found in their car in a pond in Telfair County a few days later. Authorities in that southeast Georgia county said the Runions had both been shot in the head.
Prosecutors alleged that Towns tried to lure the victims with the prospect of buying the car, but intended to rob them.
Towns, who was 28 at the time of the Runions’ deaths, turned himself in, and he was indicted for murder by a grand jury.
According to the Supreme Court ruling, 50 prospective grand jurors were summoned to appear on March 16, 2015, but fewer than 16 showed up on time. The presiding judge ordered some of those who hadn’t appeared to be located by the Telfair sheriff, and asked the court clerk to identify four possible candidates for the grand jury from a list of prospective petit jurors who could show up quickly.
Two of those four reported, and others summoned for the grand jury later also reported, and a grand jury was empaneled on March 16.
That grand jury, with the two originally on the petit juror list, returned a murder indictment against Towns the same day.
Towns filed a motion to dismiss the indictment, alleging the two on the petit juror list were not chosen at random. Towns’ attorney said the clerk telephoned those four individuals, whom she knew personally. In a 2017 ruling, the trial court concurred and dismissed the murder indictment.
Prosecutors appealed that ruling to the Supreme Court. The high court majority concluded that while the petit jurors were selected at random from a master jury list, in selecting the two individuals who eventually served on the grand jury, the clerk:
” . . . relied on her personal knowledge of the prospective petit jurors, her own assessment of the extent to which she had the information necessary to contact them, and her estimate of the likelihood that they would be available to report immediately. Those selections were not ‘random’ in any sense of the word.”
The Oconee Circuit District Attorney, which prosecutes cases in Telfair and six other South Georgia counties, is seeking the death penalty against Towns.
The Runions, who lived in the Wendwood subdivision off Holly Springs Road, were married for 38 years. According to their obituary, in 1991 the Runions founded Forever Greatful Ministries, which helps families in need in the Marietta area. He was retired from AT & T and she was a preschool teacher at Johnson Ferry Christian Academy.
They were longtime members of Mt. Paran Church of God North on Allgood Road.
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Byrne was indicted by a Cobb Superior Court grand jury on Oct. 3 on eight felony counts, including malice murder, felony murder, conspiracy to commit a felony and violation of rackeetering laws.
Another count alleges that in March of this year, Byrne asked an individual identified as “J.G.” to have Wheeler killed in exchange for money.
The indictment states that Byrne conspired with Wheeler to commit the murder of Moore, who was found stabbed to death multiple times with a knife in his home at 2808 Gracewood Drive on Jan. 25, 2014.
Byrne had been the owner of Best Dang Bakery Around in Woodstock, and Moore had been an investor, according to testimony presented at Wheeler’s trial.
Byrne lived at Moore’s Gracewood Drive home for seven years, according to the indictment, and each man had a 50 percent ownership stake in the bakery, of around $35,000 each.
By Jan. 2014, Moore wanted out of the business partnership, concerned about Byrne’s spending habits, according to the indictment, which stated that Byrne had moved of the East Cobb home by then.
The indictment alleges that Byrne and Wheeler, a former bakery employee who had served 10 years in prison in Ohio for armed robbery and other offenses, conspired to steal from Moore. The plot, according to the indictment, was to have Wheeler come to Moore’s home and commit assault, burglary and theft.
After Moore was found dead, the indictment states, the plot involved “tampering with evidence and false statements.”
Johnathan Wheeler
The indictment alleges that Byrne let Wheeler come to his home and shower after the killing, and that Byrne offered Wheeler a clean change of clothes.
According to the indictment, Wheeler confessed to the murder to his cousin, Cynthia Wheeler. She testified at Wheeler’s trial last year that they went back to Moore’s home to stage a crime scene and steal items.
The indictment said Byrne later stole Moore’s partnership interest, helped Cynthia and Johnathan Wheeler pay bills and paid for a trip Byrne and Wheeler took to the Florida Keys and for vehicles for Wheeler.
Byrne was interviewed by police two days after the murder and denied any role, according to the indictment. Wheeler was charged with homicide on Aug. 16, 2014.
In 2016, Cynthia Wheeler was sentenced for concealing a death, burglary and tampering with evidence, and agreed to testify against her cousin.
According to the Georgia Department of Corrections, Johnathan Wheeler is incarcerated at the Smith State Prison in south Georgia.
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A man living on Terrell Mill Road and who was charged with the death of a motorist in a fatal crash on I-20 in July has been indicted on three counts of vehicular homicide.
The Cobb District Attorney’s Office said Mark Steven Ridling, 29, of 1550 Terrell Mill Road, was indicted by a Cobb Superior Court grand jury on Oct. 3.
According to the indictment, Ridling was driving a Hyundai Azera in Interstate 20 near Factory Shoals Road in South Cobb after 2 a.m. on July 7 when his vehicle, which was traveling well in excess of the posted 70 mph speed limits, changed lanes. The Hyundai then struck a Toyota Corolla driven by Brian Betts, 47, of Atlanta, who later died at Grady Memorial Hospital as a result of the crash.
The indictment also said Ridling was driving while under the influence, and that he was driving “in a reckless manner on reckless disregard of the safety of persons and property.” Betts’ car overturned and Ridling’s Hyundai struck a barrier on the interstate.
Ridling suffered minor injuries and also was taken to Grady. He was arrested the same day and remains in the Cobb County Adult Detention Center without bond, according to Cobb Sheriff’s Office records.
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