A former Atlanta police sergeant has been sentenced to federal prison for conspiring to violate civil rights by breaking into a private residence without a warrant to search for drugs.
Wilbert Stallings of Conyers was the sergeant over the narcotics team involved in the shooting of 92-year-old Kathryn Johnston during a 2006 raid at her home.
U.S. Attorney David E. Nahmias said the 45-year-old Stallings should feel fortunate that the resident in this case was not home, or this civil-rights conspiracy could have had the same end as the one that took Johnston's life.
Stallings was sentenced to 18 months in prison to be followed by two years of supervised release, and was ordered to perform 80 hours of community service. He pleaded guilty to the civil-rights
conspiracy charge on March 24th, 2008.
(Associated Press)
First, the new swine flu strain IS treatable with existing drugs, Tamiflu and Relenza. The
The typical mortgage is 30 years. But walk a beat in Atlanta, and that house could be yours in half that time — and for just a little money down.
As a solution to metro Atlanta’s foreclosure crisis, a lawmaker plans to propose giving foreclosed, abandoned homes to county police officers, who usually can’t afford to live in the neighborhoods they’re sworn to protect.
Of course, the deal would come with a catch: officers must agree to serve 15 years on the force before they get the property deed. And the board of commissioners would have to persuade lenders holding the liens to give several shuttered homes to the county in exchange for tax breaks.
“I thought somebody should be in these homes,” said Fulton County Commissioner Robb Pitts, who plans to introduce the idea to the board. “Here’s a way to help a group of people who put their lives on the line for us on a daily basis at a relatively minor cost.”Cities across the country are trying to find solutions to filling up houses abandoned by people who couldn’t afford their mortgages. Several are using federal money to buy foreclosed properties and sell them at cut-rate prices or interest rates. Georgia has consistently been in the top 10 in foreclosed properties, with the nation’s sixth highest foreclosure rate in November, according to RealtyTrac, a Web site that tracks foreclosures.
“I think we have a short window because this probably won’t be the situation four or five years from now. If we can take advantage of it now, I think we’ll have a receptive audience,” he said.For their part, officers would have to come up with $2,500 down payment and be responsible for all taxes, insurance, utilities and maintenance. Pitts said he plans to meet as soon as next week with several “major lenders,” whom he declined to name, to discuss his plan.
“Here’s an opportunity for them to have some goodwill coming from the community in which they do business by helping with public safety,” Pitts said. “If we could get 200 (homes), that would be a good start.”Some say the idea is a creative and original solution to a crisis.
“I’d think lenders would be very interested in stabilizing neighborhoods in which they have mortgages on other properties,” said Bruce Seaman, an economics professor at the Andrew Young School of Policy Studies at Georgia State University.Programs that subsidize housing for public servants are being tried in other places. Grand Prairie, Texas, is offering foreclosed properties the city acquired with federal bailout money to government or district school employees, with the city helping with the down payment and closing costs.
“How many properties can it be?” Seaman said. “The departments aren’t huge. Lending agencies being asked to participate will find this, upon reflection, a very wise move on their part.”The Fulton County Police Department has 130 officers, 18 fewer than its target number of 148. The starting salary is $32,646 for high school graduates, and $38,000 for officers with a bachelor’s degree, so finding houses they can afford in the city is tough.
“The officers are able to obtain a home for very little down, the community gets a police officer and the department can use this as a recruiting tool,” he said.If it’s successful, firefighters or others could later be added.
“We can’t be everything to everybody in the beginning,” Pitts said.Moving police into the neighborhood could help reduce crime and attract buyers to other abandoned homes, Seaman said.
“I would like for one to move next door to me,” said the 85-year-old veteran. “That way, he’d see a lot of things I see and can’t do nothing about. The crime would probably go further down the street somewhere.”(AP)
A former Atlanta police officer pleaded guilty to federal conspiracy charges for his role in a botched drug raid that ended in the shooting death of a 92-year-old woman.
The former officer, Arthur Tesler, faces more than 10 years in prison on a charge of conspiracy to violate civil rights resulting in death. The police originally said officers had gone to the home of the woman, Kathryn Johnston, in northwest Atlanta, in 2006 after an informant said he had bought drugs there. But after finding none, officers tried to cover up the mistake by planting bags of marijuana, prosecutors said.
In May, Mr. Tesler, 42, was sentenced to four and a half years in prison for lying to investigators, but federal prosecutors decided to pursue more charges after reviewing the case.
(AP)
Click here for more GPB News coverage of police affairs.
A federal appeals court has ruled that strip searches of prisoners entering the Fulton County Jail do not violate their constitutional rights, even without a reasonable suspicion they may have contraband. The 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled Thursday in a lawsuit by 11 former inmates who were made to disrobe with a group of up to 40 others, showered and were visually inspected by deputies before "entering or re-entering the general population" of the jail. The policy was followed even when the prisoners were returning from court to be released from the jail or arrested on a traffic ticket warrant. Circuit Judge Rosemary Barkett dissented. She questioned the
need for strip searches without reason to suspect a prisoner concealed a weapon, drugs or other contraband.
(Associated Press)
A federal appeals court says drug possession with intent to distribute is not the same as drug trafficking when it comes to sentencing a person convicted of the crime. A Savannah man appealed his conviction for possession of more than five grams of cocaine with intent to distribute, and his sentence of 18 years in prison. That 18 year sentence came with a provision that he be banned from receiving federal benefits for life. An 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals panel upheld the conviction on Friday but reversed on the benefits ban, ruling that was reserved for actual distribution of drugs.
Gov. Sonny Perdue has suspended collection of taxes on free samples of prescription drugs, saying it conflicts with the tax exemption on prescription sales. The move comes in the wake of a 2001 court decision that contact lenses, available only with a valid prescription, are taxable to the manufacturer or distributor when distributed by them as free samples. Perdue's order also covers drug samples provided for clinical trials. He said taxing those puts the state at a disadvantage in attracting research and development activities to Georgia.
An Atlanta-area company and four Georgia men have pleaded guilty to conspiring to import unauthorized prescription drugs from Central America and selling them on the Internet, taking in millions of dollars. The pleas entered Friday in federal court are the latest stemming from the indictment of 11 people and Norcross-based Hi-Tech Phamarceuticals Inc. in September 2006. Two North Carolina men admitted their roles in February 2007. All defendants pleaded guilty to conspiring to commit mail and wire fraud and importation and distribution of adulterated, unapproved, and mislabeled drugs. Other defendants were from South Dakota and Belize, where
prosecutors said generic versions of pharmaceuticals such as Xanax, Valium, Ambien, Vioxx, Zoloft, Viagra, and Cialis were manufactured in what essentially was a four-room house.
(Associated Press)
The US Supreme Court has turned down an appeal today from two Georgia inmates who face capital punishment.
The court blocked the executions of Samuel Crowe and Joseph Williams last fall while it considered a challenge to Kentucky's lethal injection procedures.
Critics of lethal injection procedures have said that if the first drug is administered incorrectly or in an insufficient dosage, the inmate could suffer excruciating pain from the other two drugs.
But because the second drug is a paralytic, he would be unable to express his discomfort.
Federal and state authorities say they have uncovered a drug smuggling route into western Georgia.
Officials seized 140 pounds of marijuana, 70 thousand dollars in cash, guns and several vehicles at an empty house in Harris County Tuesday. The drugs were packed and ready for shipment.
The Columbus Metro Narcotics Task Force and the Harris County Sheriff's Department say the raid is part of a long-term operation.
Harris County Sheriff Mike Jolley says the find indicates a cross-border drug route:
“We believe the drugs were brought in through a traffic route from the Mexico – Texas area. So DEA is in the process of doing follow-up investigative activity.”Authorities have put out a warrant for a convicted felon in connection to the case. They believe he is part of a larger drug trafficking ring throughout the southeast.