Jan. 26

Driving without a valid license

Failure to obey a stop sign

Traffic complaint/violation

A vehicle failed to stop at a Springfield stop sign and was pulled over. A check showed the driver did not have a valid driver’s license. The driver said he had been living in the U.S. for 17 years and never had obtained a license.

Jan. 25

Theft by taking

A Guyton resident said that while he was at church, a trailer had been stolen from his residence. He presented the tag receipt, and deputies obtained the vehicle information from it.

Jan. 25

Criminal trespass

Deputies were called to a Springfield home after a man said he got into an argument with another man, and the suspect kicked his door and hit his storm door, shattering the glass. The suspect said he went to the complainant’s home to confront him about the complainant quitting his job. The suspect said his father lent the complainant money and he was supposed to be working to pay off the debt. The suspect admitted to losing his temper and damaging the door.

Jan. 25

Battery - family violence

Obstruction of law enforcement

En route to a call on a domestic dispute, deputies were informed the female victim had been choked and thrown to the ground. Once the deputies were on the scene, she told them she got into an argument with her boyfriend after she refused to buy him beer. They got into an argument, and he threw her keys into the yard. She said she was going to call law enforcement, and he grabbed her around the neck and threw her to the ground. He then grabbed her phone to prevent her from calling 911. The boyfriend left before deputies arrived because he is still on probation.

Jan. 24

Traffic complaint/violation

Possession of a Schedule II controlled substance

A deputy saw a vehicle run the stop sign at Blue Jay and McCall roads and nearly lose control as it negotiated the turn. The vehicle’s tag lights were not working and its windshield was cracked. The deputy noticed the front-seat passenger looking back at the rear window several times in an odd, rapid manner.

The front-seat occupants made odd, stiff movements as if they did not want the deputy to see them bending over in their seat. The driver appeared nervous and hardly looked at the deputy. The front-seat passenger would not look at the deputy at all. The deputy noticed the smell of burnt marijuana and asked the driver about it. The driver said he had not had the vehicle for long and it smelled like that when he got it. The deputy said he was going to search the vehicle, and the two occupants said there were drugs or weapons on them or in the vehicle.

After other deputies arrived, they found in the passenger’s wallet a clear cigarette pack wrapper containing a clear to off-white crystal approximately the size of a pencil eraser. The passenger said, “Man, that looks like meth,” and said somebody else must have left it in there. Neither the driver nor the passenger claimed ownership of the crystal.

A further search revealed a plastic baggie with a partially-burned hand-rolled cigarette believed to have marijuana, plus a cigar-type casing containing possible marijuana. Both men in the vehicle were confronted with the marijuana-related items.  The driver said those were his and he forgot they were in the vehicle.

The passenger asked to speak to a deputy privately and said the meth belonged to the driver and more meth was in the vehicle. Deputies did not find more meth, but the passenger said the driver bought meth earlier that day at a Pooler gas station. The driver said he did not have any meth and the passenger was lying. As the deputy who initially responded went to assist the tow truck driver, he heard another deputy scream, “It’s in his mouth,” and two other deputies attempted to stop the driver from swallowing more meth. The driver swallowed a baggie of meth, and the driver acknowledged he consumed several crystals.

The passenger told deputies repeatedly he could show them where they could buy meth and, at the hospital, the driver said he didn’t swallow the meth but it instead was in his pants. The driver said he knew he had ruined his life again and was headed back to prison because he was on parole for burglary.

After the ER staff was told he lied about swallowing the meth, they ceased his treatment and discharged him. The driver told deputies he had the baggie of meth in his mouth but if fell out of his mouth and into his hands, even though he was handcuffed with his hands behind his back. That’s when he tucked the baggie into his pants.

The driver was charged with possession of a controlled substance, possession of less than one ounce of a marijuana, false report of a crime, obstructing and hindering a law enforcement officer, tampering with evidence, stop sign violation, tag light violation, a windshield violation and a safety belt violation.

Jan. 23

Disorderly conduct

A deputy responded to a possible wreck on Springfield-Egypt Road, and the driver in question was walking in the middle of the road, talking on the phone. He said a deer ran out into the road and when he went to avoid it, his truck slid into the ditch. He said he had been stuck for about three hours.

The deputy smelled alcohol on the driver, who said he had a few beers in the truck and started drinking them to pass the time after he went into the ditch. When asked why he didn’t call the sheriff’s office to notify them of the accident, he said he didn’t have enough money to pay the tow bill so he was trying to reach his insurance company so they could send a tow.

The insurance company was unable to provide a tow truck, so the next available wrecker on the call list was dispatched. The tow truck driver gave the man a ride back to Springfield, where his girlfriend was going to pick him up.

Several minutes later, Springfield officers were called to where the tow truck driver had taken the driver of the wrecked pickup. The tow truck driver said the other driver was yelling “(expletive)” several times. The tow truck driver asked him to cease speaking that way and lower his tone. The man then became offensive and started yelling at him, asking him if he wanted to go across the street and fight. The complainant then called 911. The offender said he just lost his temper and he apologized to the complainant.

Jan. 22

Harassing phone calls

A Guyton woman said she received unwanted emails and text messages from a former life partner. The texts appeared to have been sent from the ex’s granddaughter’s cell phone, but she said they were obviously from her ex. She described previous escalating issues that prompted her to seek assistance from the Victim/Witness Assistance Program.

Jan. 21

Terroristic threats and acts

An Eden man said that when he was driving home, he got a call from his neighbor, and she was yelling at him, cursing him and calling him names, but she would not say why he was angry. He called her son to find out why she was angry and, when he got home, he saw two men walking toward him from the bushes in front of his home. They started screaming unintelligibly at him and they appeared to be carrying baseball bats. They yelled at him that they were going to “kick his (backside).” He warned them he would shoot them if they came in his yard. Both subjects stopped just inside in his yard in his driveway, cursing him and calling him names for a few minutes before leaving.

The man the victim called said the subjects came to his home and began yelling and cursing at him, threatening him in front of his young son. His wife said her mother-in-law called her at work and told her that her husband was going to get his (expletive) kicked if he did not go to jail. The second victim said the suspects were mad at him because they believed he had called county code enforcement on them to report violations.

The two male suspects said they confronted the first victim because they claimed he had been driving recklessly while children were outside playing. They denied having any weapons or threatening the first victim. As deputies attempted to question the suspects, they continuously interrupted each other with complaints the two victims were abusing prescription drugs.

Because each victim wanted to prosecute each offender, and with the deputy fearing the situation would escalate if he referred them to a warrant hearing, all three offenders were arrested.

Jan. 20

Criminal damage to property

A mobile home owner said the previous tenant destroyed the residence, damaging portions of it when he was asked to move out. There were holes in the walls and doors, pipes removed from under the sink, damage to the stove’s cooking elements, human and animal waste left in the bathroom and unseen damage from a dog under the residence.

Jan. 19

Domestic dispute

A neighbor called deputies about a domestic dispute next door. When they arrived, the woman there said she and her husband had been arguing about finances. She said her husband became irate and started throwing eggs and dumping drinks from the refrigerator onto the kitchen floor. When she tried to stop him, he dumped a pitcher of Kool-Aid on her head. She also said her husband pushed her, and she pushed him back. The husband said they argued but he never touched her, though she hit him on the left side of his head and neck and grabbed his groin area. He also had a scrape on his arm that he said was the result of his wife throwing a glass at him.

Since deputies had been called out to the residence numerous times in the past, both parties were cited for disorderly house.

Jan. 18

Criminal trespass

An Eden man said someone had been in his backyard attempting to steal his scooter, so he fired his pistol into the ground. The subjects left but their car was parked next to his house. Because it was dark outside, he could not see the subjects well enough to describe them. A patrol of the area did not turn up a vehicle matching the victim’s description.

Jan. 16

Theft by taking - felony

A man said he was cleaning up his mother-in-law’s gravesite at a Bloomingdale cemetery. The headstone did not appear to be correct, so he inspected it and it bore the name of a former soldier who died two-and-a-half years ago. He said his nephew placed the headstone at the grave a few days earlier. He determined the headstone came from a Springfield cemetery, but he did not know which one. The headstone was taken as evidence and turned over to the crime scene unit.