A total of fourteen pending cases in the Superior Court of Coffee County are now ready to be presented to a jury during September’s criminal trial week scheduled for the end of the month. According to a copy of the court’s trial calendar, half of the cases set to move forward consist of defendants facing aggravated assault, with other charges including arson, burglary/theft, possession of a firearm by a convicted felon, obstruction of law enforcement, child molestation, and entering an automobile. The calendar lists seven individuals charged with aggravated assault, including James Gregory Burch (two counts); Tomas James…
Author: Staff Reports
Clayton Lundy, a man who made headlines last year for allegedly sexually assaulting a young female in Walmart, pleaded guilty this week in the Superior Court of Coffee County. While Lundy was facing life in prison, the plea deal resulted in a lesser sentence, which included 20 years in prison. A Douglas Police Department report accused Lundy of approaching a female from behind in the baby department at Walmart between 8:00 p.m. and 8:15 p.m. on October 31, 2021, and pulling a pocket knife on her. The victim reported that he pressed the knife against her neck, reached…
One person lost their life Tuesday morning following a wreck that occurred around 10:00 a.m. on GA Highway 32 West. Sources told DouglasNow that a Mercury Mountaineer is said to have entered into the opposing lane in the path of a truck hauling ice. The Mountaineer then struck the truck, causing it to turn over. When the ice truck flipped it caught fire, with the driver knocking out a broken window and escaping just before the vehicle became engulfed with flames. He was transported to a nearby hospital to receive a medical check, but was “up and walking” before leaving the…
An altercation that reportedly began over a pair of misplaced AirPods caused Charles William Thrift Jr. of Douglas to receive felony charges last week. The lost item led Thrift Jr. to allegedly hit two family members and threaten to shoot a victim while pointing a shotgun at her. A Coffee County Sheriff’s Office report states that on September 7 around 7:30 p.m. he spoke to a woman at a residence on Rolling Hills Lane in Douglas regarding an altercation that had occurred involving 69-year-old Thrift Jr. The woman reported that she had been asleep but woke up to…
The Douglas Police Department recently arrested Kavonte Shiqwan Debro in connection to a 2020 shooting. Debro was the third suspect to receive charges related to the assault, with the other two apprehended in 2020 and recently pleading guilty. The shooting that led to Debro’s charges occurred on August 8, 2020, with officers reporting that they arrived at a location on East Baker Highway and discovered the victim, Travion Snell, bleeding from the neck with a gunshot wound. Snell ended up being life-flighted to Savannah for treatment, but survived his injuries. According to the report, a witness…
A Coffee County Jail jail officer, Siejdra Harrell of Douglas, has been charged on two counts after she allegedly brought in contraband to an inmate held in the jail. DouglasNow received a copy of the incident report from the arrest, but no details of the case were included. On Friday, DouglasNow reached out to an official with the Coffee County Sheriff’s Office about the jailer’s arrest. The official responded, “After a cell search, jailers with the Coffee County Sheriff’s Office found cell phones and other contraband. After a brief investigation, it was determined that an employee…
Rusty Spell of Broxton strikes again. Allegedly, of course. Spell was recently arrested and charged with his third offense of theft by taking since May 2021 after he allegedly stole a cargo trailer from a local business. Spell has spent time in prison previously for similar charges, with his most recent release being in 2019 after a burglary conviction in Coffee County. According to a Douglas Police Department incident report, an officer was dispatched to a location regarding a possible theft on September 6 around 10:56 a.m. When the officer arrived, he spoke with a sales…
Bo Dukes will carry out his 25-year sentence for concealing the death of Irwin County teacher Tara Grinstead after the Court of Appeals denied him a new trial last week. Dukes appealed his conviction shortly after his trial in 2019, where a Wilcox County jury found him guilty on four charges, including two counts of making false statements, one count of hindering apprehension or punishment of a criminal, and one count of concealing the death of another. In Dukes’ motion, his defense counsel argued that the courts should not have allowed his confession to the GBI…
Several individuals appeared before Judge Andy Spivey this week for bonds hearings on pending charges, with only two defendants, Shedrick King and Quanda Standifer, having their motions approved. King, according to a copy of an arrest warrant, was adjudicated guilty in 1997, at the age of 18, on one count of purchase, possession, manufacture, distribution, or sale of marijuana, which led to a felony conviction. In Georgia, any person convicted of a felony is prohibited from owning or possessing a firearm and can face a prison sentence of 5 years if found guilty of the offense. …
A former Coffee Correctional Facility inmate is headed back to prison after he returned to the facility shortly after his release and threw a book bag containing contraband, some of which were weapons, over the fence for another inmate to retrieve. Anthony Derek Franklin Jr. pleaded guilty to the charges on Thursday morning, with the judge sending him back to the place he just couldn’t seem to leave behind. According to the Georgia Department of Corrections website, Franklin Jr. was serving a 3-year prison sentence for a possession of methamphetamine conviction in Columbia County between the dates of…