About Daily citizen-news (Dalton, Georgia) 2017-2022 | View Entire Issue (Jan. 1, 2022)
DAILY Citizen-News www.dailycitizen.news DALTON, GEORGIA, Weekend, January 1/2, 2022 $1.50 Dalton Elks Lodge provides Christmas cheer BY CHARLES Oliver charlesoliver@dailycitizen.news Amber Henderson teared up as she looked at all of the boxes of food, clothes and toys stacked on tables at the Dalton Elks Lodge. ???I just can't imagine a child not having Christmas or an elderly person without food," said Henderson, co-chair of the Elks' Christmas program. ???We are going to have 30 to 50 volun teers here tonight, packing food and toys and clothes for families in need," she said Thursday night. ???Some of the volunteers are Elks. Some are family members. Some of the food comes from the Chattanooga Area Food Bank. Some of it we bought with donations.??? This project helped 100 families repre senting more than 300 people in Whitfield and Murray counties. Donations of money and items came from lodge members, friends of members, local businesses and other individuals. Planning for the event starts in October. ???We have hams, milk, bread," said Junior Roberson, lodge president. ???We have four boxes of food for each family, including a box of fresh fruits and vegetables.??? Roberson said he has been a lodge mem ber for 18 years and the Christmas program was going on when he joined. ???It gets bigger every year," he said. ???We give people applications. It has a wish list for toys and for clothes for children and their parents. We do our best to make sure we get what's on that wish list. Every child gets toys.??? While the Elks are known as a social organization, they also operate numerous charity programs ???We try to help our communities,??? Roberson said. ???We have a lot of different CHARLES OUVER/Daily Citizen-News People load boxes full of food and Christmas presents for a family at the Dalton Elks Lodge. From left are volunteer Tyson Langford; Amber Henderson, co-chair of the Elks??? Christmas program; and Michelle Langham, co-chair of the Christmas program. programs, especially for children. We offer scholarships. This lodge alone gave out over $16,000 in scholarships this year. You get a lot of joy helping others, especially children. It???s a lot of hard work, but it's worth every minute of it.??? Michelle Langham, co-chair of the Christmas program, said the food and other items are boxed up on Dec. 23 and given to families on Christmas Eve Day. ???We do a pickup and delivery,??? she said. ???It???s probably about 60% pickup and 40% delivery. Last year I helped carry the boxes out to the people who drove here for pick up. They were so thankful. It???s really great to see that. We have some families with special needs children. We???ve got seniors who live alone. We???ve got seniors who are raising their grandchildren. We???ve got people in a lot of different circumstances. And I feel really blessed to help them.??? Dalton resident Tyson Langford, recipi ent of the 2020 Elks Legacy Scholarship, was one of the volunteers helping pack boxes. ???Both of my parents are members of the Elks, and I???ve been coming to the lodge all of my life,??? he said. ???I was honored to receive the Legacy Scholarship, and I wanted to give back.??? Jeff Smith, a former lodge president, said he has been a member for 38 years, and the Christmas program was talking place when he joined. ???It's heartwarming to see what this can do to help these families,??? he said. ???For a lot of these families these are the only presents, the only toys, these children will get. We???ve got members who are in the schools, in the churches, and they tell us ???Hey, we???ve got a family here who needs some help.??? Social agencies also know that we do this every year and refer people to us.??? Smith noted that the Elks??? charitable efforts have a particular focus on young people, pointing to its annual youth soccer tournament and free throw contest as well as a group foster home it funds in the metro Atlanta area. The Elks started in New York City in 1868 as a social club, with early members drawn largely from the many theaters in the city. According to the organization???s website (elks.org), it has grown to more than 1.1 million members in more than 2,100 lodges nationwide The Dalton lodge was instituted on Dec. 25, 1911, with Frank Pruden as its first exalted ruler. The lodge was rechartered in 1940, and in May of that year members pur chased the Dewy Wright house on Cuyler Street for $7,500. The lodge remained in that building until 1967, when it moved to its current location at 1212 Elkwood Drive, near Hamilton Medical Center. The lodge currently has 486 members. To be considered for membership, a person must be at least 21, an American citizen and profess a belief in God. Membership has been open to women since the mid-1990s. State compensation difficult path for Georgia man freed from wrongful conviction BY Asia Ashley aashley@cnhinews.com AUGUSTA ??? When Devonia Inman was released from Augusta State Medical Prison on Dec. 20 after spending two decades behind bars for a murder he didn???t commit, he became one of more than 2,900 people since 1989 to be exonerated in the country. Maurice Possley, National Registry of Exonerations senior researcher, said wrongful convictions commonly stem from perjury, false accusations, misconduct by officials, incorrect witness identification and false confessions. Inman was accused of wearing a ski mask during the robbery and murder of Donna Brown, a white store manager of a Taco Bell in Adel, in the parking lot of the restaurant in 1998. Inman???s attorneys say police coerced witnesses into identifying Inman ??? who had been arrested after the murder in an unrelated incident ??? as the suspect. Prosecutors sought the death penalty for Inman, who is Black, though he was ulti mately sentenced to life without parole. He spent 23 years behind bars for the murder based on testimony from witnesses who later recanted. NRE reports that Black people are seven times more likely to be wrongly convicted of murder than white people. Of Black peo ple convicted of murder, 15% of the vic tims are white, but that number more than doubles as it pertains to the percentage of Black people, 31%, who were later wrongly convicted of murdering a white person. ???All of it is wrapped up in the way that race plays into the criminal legal system,??? said Christina Cribbs, senior attorney for nonprofit Georgia Innocence Project, which represents and assists those who have been wrongly convicted in Georgia. ???Specifically in this case, Donna Brown was a white woman and anytime you have a white victim, and the person that is arrested and prosecuted for the offense is really non-white, but especially Black, there is a very much higher chance that the state will actually seek the death penalty in those cases which they did do in Devonia???s case.??? A fundraiser was launched Dec. 20 by Georgia Innocence Project for Inman to begin his new life, as Georgia is one of more than 10 states ??? including Arizona, Arkansas, Delaware, Kentucky, New Mexico, North Dakota, Oregon, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, South Dakota and Wyoming ??? that do not pro vide compensation to exonerees after a wrongful conviction. In these states, some nonprofits provide assistance or fundraisers are launched individually. In Georgia, an exoneree can petition to a state legislator who can spon sor an individual compensation bill that would have to garner majority approval in the state legislature. The process is often unfair as there are Photo provided by Lathan Word Lathan Word, left, pictured with his late grandmother, was exonerated in 2011 after serving nearly 12 years for a wrongful armed robbery conviction in Georgia. He is one of a handful of people in Georgia who had to petition legislators to receive exoneree compensation. no set procedures for determining amounts and compensation can be different for each exoneree, Cribbs said. ???Sometimes those are successful and sometimes they're not. And one of the big problems with it is that there are no guidelines or structures so it???s very hit or miss,??? Cribbs said. ???Like the compensation statutes in other states, they typically have a dollar amount that you get for each year that you're wrongfully convicted. They range anywhere from like $30,000 to $70,000 (per year) depending on the state." Robert Clark was exonerated in Georgia in 2005 after serving more than 23 years in prison for a 1981 rape he didn???t commit. Then-Gov. Sonny Perdue signed a bill into law that granted Clark $1.2 million over time. Only a handful of other exonerees in Georgia have received payments, a couple of them less than half that amount, though nearly equitable in the amount of time they???d served, according to reports. Attempts have been made in previous legislative session to pass an exoneree com pensation bill in Georgia but no laws have been approved. NRE reports more than 45 cases of exoneration in Georgia since 1989. Advocates said compensation is a neces sary form of eradicating the injustice of the wrongly convicted and helps provide them with financial support for basic necessities like food, transportation, housing, medical care and mental health services. Education and workforce assistance and >Please see FREED, 3A Daily Citizen-News of the North Georgia Newspaper Group, Copyright 2022 n /dailycitizennews / @thedailycitizen pictures.daltonnow.com INDEX Viewpoints 4-5A | Obituaries 6A | Classifieds 4B | Comics 1C, 4C IlliIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII 6 97113 05402 2 Today???s weather Rain possible, high near 74, low near 46. Page 2A. The Daily Citizen DALTONnow.com MOBILE APP DOWNLOAD IT TODAY! ??? Available at the App Store for Apple and the Play Store for Android. ??? Download daily e-editions to read offline at your convenience. Browse photos and watch videos of local and national events. Access FREE local weather, events, classifieds and shopping information. Share articles, photos, coupons and local events with your friends on social networks. Subscribers can access daily editions and premium mobile content for one low price.
