Same Suspect Implicated In Recent Maysville Elementary School Break-In
Principal Chuck Bell took last Thursday night’s burglary of Commerce Middle School personally. His laptop computer was one of four taken in the break-in.
But a rare convergence of events gave Bell his computer back — along with everything else taken from CMS — and solved the April 27 burglary of Maysville Elementary School as well.
Jackson County deputies arrested Michael Kevin Banks, 36, Hwy. 82 Spur, Friday morning at the Super 8 Motel in Gainesville. They recovered the four laptops taken from CMS, along with some computer accessories and more than $300 cash earned by the school’s Relay for Life Team. They also recovered a camera taken in the Maysville Elementary School robbery, said Major David Cochran of the Jackson County Sheriff’s Department.
A 28-year-old man and his 4-year-old son remain in critical condition with burns from a mobile home blaze that started when two 4-year-olds playing with matches lit a fire and tried to put out the flames by spraying an aerosol can.
Matthew Sutherland received second- and third-degree burns after rushing into the burning mobile home to save his son, Seth Sutherland, who was in the room where the fire started just before 7:30 a.m. Saturday, according to Steve Nichols, director of Jackson County Emergency Services and assistant chief of the Nicholson Fire Department.
The trailer, on Brooks Drive off Old U.S. Highway 441 in the community of Center, was the home of Heather Obar and her 4-year-old son and 8-year-old daughter, Nichols said.
A father and his 4-year-old son were in critical condition Sunday at Grady Memorial Hospital after a fire at a mobile home in Jackson County, northeast of Atlanta.
Authorities said the blaze started inside a mobile home, possibly when a child was playing with a lighter and an aerosol spray can, WSB-TV reported.
Other family members in the home managed to escape injury, but the 4-year-old was badly burned and his father was injured when he went into the home to rescue the toddler, according to the report.
I was driving up 400 and a cop stopped me for speeding. There was traffic to my right so I pulled over to the left against the median wall. The officer was agitated with me and I didn't like his attitude. I couldn't pull over to the right because of the traffic. What should I have done? Was I dumb to do that?
Dear Dummy:
Having been there myself, I'm guessing the officer was a bit on the agitated side knowing that he was about to be run over. The only thing that would fit in that lane is a clown car so I'm sure half of yours and the cop's car, which of course is behind yours and will be the first one hit, was sticking out there to be hit by one of our fine drivers who just may be on his or her cell phone, texting something insignificant that could have waited.
A Pendergrass police officer is suspended without pay as authorities investigate a criminal complaint that he falsely arrested a man during a recent traffic stop, according to the chief of that western Jackson County city.
Georgia Bureau of Investigation agents are examining evidence against Bill Garner, a Pendergrass patrol officer, who allegedly "arrested a passenger in the vehicle for an open container (of alcohol) when no open container was present," said Pendergrass police Chief Rob Russell.
The evidence includes a video from the camera in a Jefferson police officer's cruiser, which arrived on the scene as backup, authorities said.
Man hospitalized after his ultralight aircraft goes down
JEFFERSON - A Gwinnett County man was flown by air ambulance to Grady Memorial Hospital after his ultralight aircraft crashed at Jackson County Airport shortly after taking off Wednesday afternoon.
The pilot, whom Jackson County sheriff's deputies declined to identify, was awake and able to speak when airport manager Bob Stapleton arrived at the crash scene. The pilot said he thought he broke a leg and a hand, but paramedics opted to have him flown to the hospital, Stapleton said.
Stapleton saw the crash through the window of the airport's office as he met with members of the Jackson County Airport Authority around 4 p.m. The group was discussing the airport's safety as the ultralight pilot lost control.
Detective Chad Knight said his officers were getting training from Lowndes County officers in drug interdiction techniques when they pulled over the truck for an expired tag on the trailer.
Because the truck was traveling between two known “source” cities, New York and Laredo, Texas, because of excessive downtime in the driver’s log book and because the driver would not make eye contact with officials, police asked for consent to search the truck. The driver, Jesus Tomas Vela Jr., complied.
Officers found 30 packs of currency heat-sealed and wrapped with sheets of fabric softener and duct taped behind the wall of the sleeper, Knight said. The department’s drug dog later alerted on the currency, confirming that it had contained drug residue, according to Knight.
JEFFERSON - Jackson County farmers and homeowners got the OK from county commissioners Monday night to burn leaves or other debris that have collected this fall.
The commission voted Monday to lift the burn ban put in place in early November to help prevent drought-fueled wild fires.
Barrow County fire officials lifted a similar burn ban last week after one rainy weekend, said Lt. Scott Dakin, spokesman for the Barrow County Fire Department.
Maysville Police Sgt. Rory Clark stopped a vehicle for speeding on the afternoon of Sunday, Nov. 18, but ended up with more than a simple speeding motorist.
The driver, along with the two passengers in the vehicle, pulled over on Comer Street in Maysville were all wanted on various charges. One passenger, Max McLinn, was actually being hunted by the United States Marshals in connection with a bank robbery. McLinn, who also had used the alias Michael Bolt, had a warrant issued by the U.S. Marshals in Virginia, Maysville police chief Clarence Sullens said.
In addition, the driver of the vehicle, Jeremy Nix of Pendergrass, was wanted on an outstanding warrant in Jackson County. He was also charged with driving without insurance and for having a suspended tag.
JEFFERSON - Jackson County commissioners have appointed former deputy warden Johnny Weaver to take the reins at the beleaguered Jackson County Correctional Institute.
Commissioners selected Weaver as the institute's warden after a two-month search to replace former warden Vickie Underwood, who was fired in August following allegations that she misused inmate labor and county funds.
The Georgia Bureau of Investigation and the state Department of Corrections launched an investigation into the misuse of inmate labor at the prison after Weaver filed a formal complaint with the corrections department in June.
