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Page 6A
Arrest of local man
clears burglaries
Last Wednesday’s arrest of a Port
Valley man, Jerrell Solomon of 412
Cliett Street, on a burglary charge led
to the solution of several other
burglaries of commercial establish¬
ments in Fort Valley. Solomon also
has been charged with five counts of
criminal attempt to commit burglary,
forgery in the First degree and
criminal trespass.
According to the arresting officer,
Detective Sergeant Christopher
Brumbaugh of the Fort Valley Police
Department, the 19-year-old Solomon
is accused of stealing a computer
terminal valued at $1,000 from the
Peach County Board of Education
Building at the corner of Knoxville
and Vineville Streets on August 23.
Solomon further is accused of
burglarizing Allied Department
Stores on August 4.
The day after the suspect was
arrested and charged with these
burglaries he confessed to burglariz¬
ing Starr Quality Cleaners and
Laundry on August 20 and the Shoe
Arson chorged
by Cornelia B. Nichols
She decided to bum him out 44
was Fort Valley Police Department
Captain Gary Trawick’s assessment
of Emma Griffin’s reason for setting
fire to the residence of 28-year-old
Solomon Avant at 311 Pine Street in
Fort Valley early Friday morning.
Griffin, charged with arson in the
first degree, is in the Houston County
Jail in lieu of posting $25,000 bond.'
No one was hurt in the fire.
According to Trawick, the couple
had been living together before the
incident and separated. Shortly
thereafter the 22-year-old suspect
used gasoline to set three fires at the
multi-family residence that also
houses two other families. Fires were
set at the front, the side door, and the
side window.
44 The fire department responded
very quickly and extinguished the
Improper disposal of
trash causes problems
ihe Fort Valley Utilities Commis
iion has had to spend $300 to $400
recently on the wastewater treatment
facility because foreign articles have
been deposited in the sewage
manholes in town.
Director Fred Sankey noted at last
week’s regular meeting of the
commission that the communator and
grit equipment had to be repaired
due to the fact that rocks, parts of
trucks, limbs, bricks, and pieces of
two by four’s had been placed in
sewer manholes instead of being
disposed of properly. sprocket for
44 We had to replace a This
the chain on the grit screw. is
the first time a replacement has been
needed as far as w<‘ know,” Sankey
reported. broken belt the
He added that a to
grit rake also had to be replaced.
City gas rates increase
by Cornelia B. Nichols
The Fort Valley Utilities Commis¬
sion acted affirmatively on the
recommendation of Administrator
Fred Sankey to pass on to customers
a price increase from Southern
Natural Gas that takes effect October
1. The price increase will not reach
customers until the November 1
billing goes out, at which time a 2.1 %
increase in the cost of gas will be
noted. Only the increased cost of gas
to the commission will be passed on
to the customers.
According to Sankey, this is 44 a
direct pass through” from the natural
gas supplier to the consumers.
Sankey did tell the commission that
gas costs may be lowered in the
future if a Section 7C application with
the Federal Energy Regulatory
Commission is approved. The
director will obtain two contracts,
Hangar being built
to house chopper
by Cornelia B. Ntchols
An aircraft hangar to house a
helicopter at the Perry/Fort Valley
Airport is 54% complete, according
to a memorandum issued by the
Georgia Department of Public Safety
last week. Frank Smisson, chairman
of the Ptrry/Fort Valley Airport
Authority, received notice Monday
morning from Rick Stancil, Assistant
Executive Counsel, that the metal
building construction, its erection
and insulation are due to be
completed this month.
Projected completion date for the
project that was begun in July is
December 21. Most of the grading
and backfill work were done in
August. C. W. “Pete 44
Fort Valley Mayor job is
Peterson said that, when the
finished, a state trooper will be on
duty at the airport day and night to
respond to any emergencies that
might arise. This should be a boom to
law enforcement efforts in Middle
Georgia. the helicopter and
Contractor for
pad is Sammy Garrison Construction
Company in Macon. Architect was
Larry Dean, Director of Design
Services.
ICca&er-®rtbune
Peach County’s best news and advertising source... since 1888
Vd. 99 -Issue 38
Shop on June $. Solomon also is
charged with trying to burglarize the
Pump House twice, Big Chic, Dairy
Queen, and Copper Kettle. The
criminal trespass charge stems from
an August 19 incident at the board of
education building.
At the time of his arrest Solomon
was out of jail on parole.
Brumbaugh said that the unda¬
maged computer terminal was found
in a trash can behind the suspect’s
residence.
fires,” reported Trawick. Clerk
Fort Valley Fire Department
Frank Joyner noted that 25 men took
three trucks and worked 35 minutes
after the alarm was turned in aboui
5:30 a.m.
After Griffin was char^cu in the
incident she was taken to the Byron
Jail and then transferred to Houston
County. Peach County Probate Judge
John W. Smisson set bail.
both pieces of equipment are used
in disposing of large solids in the
wastewater treatment process, the
director explained. commission
At the meeting
chairman W. F. Freshwater, Sr.
requested residents to confine their
trash to the proper areas above the
sidewalk so that further expenses and
problems at the wastewater treat¬
ment facility can be avoided.
then file a 7C application. The city
should save approximately $1 per
thousand cubic feet of natural gas if
the application is approved. investi¬
The commission has been
gating this avenue to purchase
natural gas at a lower cost since May.
At last week’s meeting Sankey told
Joe Frank Rinehart that propane gas
rather than natural gas should be
considered for use by the city of
FERC approved the city’s 7C
application. Rinehart had raised the
question of relative costs of the two
kinds of gas.
In other action the commission
voted to spend $300 to lay a drainage
pipe for the Peach County Board of
Education near the high school. The
Board will provide the pipe while the
commission will furnish the labor.
At last month’s meeting the matter
came up when the Board expressed
the desire to eliminate an open
drainage ditch near the new band
building. At that time Rinehart
agreed with other commission
members that the commission
wanted to cooperate with the board
but he would prefer to have cost
estimates before giving the go
ahead.
In last week’s vote the commission
voted unanimously to do the work
with the exception of Frank
Spearman, who abstained. Spearman
is principal of Peach County High
School.
Wednesday. September 17,1986
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THE HOUSE FORMERLY OWNED BY Mrs. bTj. Hudson
was moved from its location on Ga. 49 north of
Fort Valley last Thursday. The activity stopped
Regents file discovery
documents in FVSC suit
Senior Assistant Attorney General
Patrick W. McKee has called upon
plaintiffs in the case of Guy Hallman
Hbnnicutt,et. al. v. Board of Regents
of the University System of Georgia,
et.al. to present facts and documents
bearing on the case against Fort
Valley State College.
In a letter from McKee to U.S.
District Court Judge Wilbur D.
Owens, Jr. dated September 11, the
plaintiffs are requested to produce all
documents that ‘‘(have) been in the
possession, control, or custody of the
Plaintiffs or of which the Plaintiffs
have knowledge..., 4 4 and facts
4 4 contended by Plaintiffs to relate to
the subject...” on which thev relv to
support their legal claim that the Fort
Valley college has not desegregated
its faculty and student body and has
not raised its curriculum to minimum
standards of academic competence.
The defendants request the firm
Charles R. Adams III and Cynthia
Trimboli Adams legal counsel for the
plaintiffs to furnish information about
their involvement in class action suits
during the last five years. Adams and
Adams are asked to state the
percentage of time in thetr legal
practice they have devoted to class
action suits.
McKee acting for Attorney General
Michael J. Bowers, also asked the
plaintiffs to state Manley F. Brown’s
involvement in the case and to
identify experts they plan to cite in
the case, brown was attorney for jack
Hunnicutt in the 1973 case Hunnicutt
v. Burge.
Oral depositions in the suit will be
taken by the plaintiffs on Monday,
October 20, in the state judicial
building in Atlanta.
Contacted by telephone, Charles
Adams said that he could not
commemt on the case except to say
that the defendants had requested an
extension of time to reply. Originally,
a reply was due by September 11, but
all lawyers for the defendants asked
for a 20-day extension.
Adams noted that he and his
partner had granted the extension.
Legal sources explained that the
motions filed by the defendants in the
case comprise what lawyers call a
“discovery" mechanism by which an
effort is made to harrow down the
issues in the cse.
A number oi wiiaaie oeorgia
residents filed a class action suit
against Fort Valley State College the
third week in August, alleging that
the formerly all-black college in the
university system has not acted to
correct problems cited in the 1975
:ase of Hunnicutt v. Burge. At that
time Owens ordered that steps be
taken to destroy the racial identity of
the college and institute educational
Drug smugglers
sentenced in
federal court
Fouv Fort Valley men were
sentenced last week to two years each
in federal prison for their involve¬
ment in a multi-million dollar cocaine
smuggling operation. U.S. District
Judge J. Robert Elliott sentenced the
four in federal court in Columbus
Each had entered a guilty plea in
June after being indicted for drug
trafficking.
Ernest Greene, 33; Terrell Lee
Dayis* 29; Charles Davis,32; and
George K. Hunnicutt, Jr., 36, ail pled
guilty to one count of conspiracy to
possess cocaine with intent to
distribute. A second charge of
conspiracy to import cocaine was
dismissed as a result of the guilty
pleas. week
Also sentenced last were
Richards H. Parks, jr. of Reynolds,
ten years, Dewey Nabors, Jr.
formerly of Fort Valley, ten years;
Albert Wayne Brown of California,
seven years; and Morris Michael
Pitts of Atlanta, five years.
Indictments were opened in May of
this year, culminating a two-year
federal investigation into the
smuggling of huge quantities of
cocaine into the Middle Georgia area
in 1983. In all, a total of four
Two chorged with robbery
Two Fort Valley men have been
charged with robbery by force after
Biaanca Ages of Route 3, Carver
Drive, was accosted as she was
walking between Laconia Circle and
College Square Wednesday night
between 8:00 and 9:00. The two
suspects, Eric Howell, also known as
Eric Howard, of 207 Project Street
and Reginald Moore of 326 Hinton
22 pages in 3 sections
traffic from several directions as the house
traveled through Fort Valley.
Photo by Pete Nichols
standards commensurate with those
at other colleges in the university
system.
planeloads of the drug were tlown
here, then driven to Miami, Florida
for distribution. The total involved
over 1700 pounds of cocaine with a
street value estimated at $170
million.
According to the Assistant
Attorney Bill Adams of Macon,
Nabors headed the operations and
was also indicted in December for
smuggling cocaine in 1981 and 1982.
His ten-year sentence was tacked
onto a 15-year term he is currently
serving in federal prison for a 1980
conviction on charges of smuggling
marijuana and methalqualone.
Adams said that the dope was
flown from Colombia to this area, in
one instance landing on land owned
by Hunnicutt, an arrangement cocaine set up
by the Davis brothers. The
was met on the ground by Greene
and Donald Edward Vining of
Florida, who also pled guilty in June.
It was re-packaged, then driven to
Miami and turned over to parks and
some Colombian distributors.
The four Fort Valley men could
have received up to 15 years in prison
and a fine of up to $250,000.
Street allegedly grabbed Ages, put a
hand over her mouth and forced her
to give them an undetermined
amount of cash, Fort Valley Police
Captain Gary Trawick reported.
The two 20-year-old men were
turned over to the > er-'h County
Sheriff’s Office. Bond was set at $500
for each suspect, Trawick stated.
25 cents