A 34-year-old Coffee County man was jailed last week on methamphetamine trafficking charges after authorities discovered a substantial amount of the drug hidden within his vehicle. Sheriff’s officials initiated a traffic stop on Richard Alan Morla last Tuesday. After making contact with Morla and a passenger, officers gained consent to search the vehicle by utilizing a canine. The canine showed a positive response on the vehicle; officers conducted a search and discovered approximately five ounces of methamphetamine hidden in a compartment in the vehicle’s frame. Both Morla and the passenger were taken into custody, and, after conducting a…
Author: Staff Reports
Several individuals, including multiple children, were seriously injured Friday afternoon following a two-vehicle collision involving a school bus. Coffee County Schools Superintendent Morris Leis stated a bus carrying approximately 11 middle school students collided with a Toyota pickup truck, which was also carrying three children. The bus was traveling north on Herbert Batten Rd. en route to Coffee High School when the pickup, which was traveling west on Van Davis Rd., allegedly pulled into its path. All occupants in the pickup were seriously injured, and a number of students on the bus were transported from the scene for treatment. One…
Officials with the Coffee County Sheriff’s Office provided further information today on two raids that occurred Wednesday involving multiple local and federal law enforcement agencies. Douglas Now reported the raids Wednesday afternoon after receiving information that they centered on a suspected large scale fraud operation that crossed state lines and involved multiple individuals. According to the authorities, Coffee County Sheriff Doyle Wooten initially received information that a scam operation was possibly being conducted at 904 N. Madison Ave. in Douglas. Wooten consulted with Douglas Police Chief Gary Casteloes and the two reached an agreement that the Douglas P.D. and Coffee…
Local and federal law enforcement agencies, including the United States Secret Service, conducted raids today at two locations on the north end of Douglas in an investigation one official described as a large scale fraud operation that crossed state lines. Authorities conducted the raids at a business located in the Spivey’s Corner shopping center on N. Peterson Ave. and another location just blocks away. Law enforcement is remaining quiet on the details of today’s raids, but one representative stated further information would be provided to the media at a later time.
Two traffic accidents that occurred around the same time Tuesday afternoon, one involving a school bus, caused a few traffic problems for a short time. Around 4 p.m., a school bus (pictured above) collided with a Chevy pickup truck at the intersection of Rocky Pond Rd. and R.S. Brigmond Rd. Students were on the bus at the time, but no injuries were reported. The Coffee County Sheriff’s Office, the Georgia State Patrol, and personnel with the Coffee County Board of Education responded to the scene. In a seperate accident (pictured below), a car rear-ended another car on Highway 32 West…
Thursday afternoon, a fisherman on the Satilla River near Highway 64 in Atkinson County found a truck submerged in the river. He called Atkinson County 911, which sent officers from the Atkinson County Sheriff’s Office and the Georgia Department of Natural Resources to the scene. They also called in the Coffee County dive team to assist. Dive team members went in the river and secured a chain to the truck. A wrecker pulled the truck from the river, and officers discovered that the truck had been reported to the Atkinson County Sheriff’s Office as stolen a month ago. The investigation…
A video depicting what appears to be two South Georgia State College students duking it out on the school’s Douglas campus has landed on YouTube. The video, apparently captured by an onlooker’s cell phone, was published on April 19 and shows two African-American females engaged in heated physical confrontation outside the school’s dining hall. Bystanders eventually break up the fight, but not until after one of the combatants winds up on the ground after being struck multiple times and having her hair pulled. Douglas Now is attempting to contact school representatives for comment. CAUTION: Video contains graphic language Video…
Coffee County students Slater Brown, pictured third from left, and Madison Dill (third from right) were recently presented the Buck Preston and Willie Pearl Davis Awards from the Douglas Lions Club. Each student received a $500 scholarship. Also pictured are the students’ parents. Pictured below, Liz Batten and Kevin Tatum with the local 4-H office receive a donation from the Lions Club to send a local 4-Her to camp.
An appeal for a new trial by convicted murderer Claron Carter was denied today by the Georgia Supreme Court, but he will return to be sentenced on further charges. Carter filed the appeal claiming the evidence presented at his trial was insufficent to support the jury’s verdict. The Supreme Court upheld the verdict and life sentence, but added the trial court judge failed to sentence him separately for armed robbery and burglary charges for which he was also found guilty. Carter was convicted in March of 2015 and sentenced to life without parole for the 2013 murder of Daquavious Reed,…
Brandon Levi Williams, wanted in connection for the murder of Kavozia Walker, was arrested Thursday in Hollywood, Florida by U.S. Marshals. Williams had been on the run from the law since February and is currently in the Broward County (Fl.) Jail awaiting extradition back to Coffee County. Officers from the Douglas Police Department responded to 120 McNeal Drive in Douglas on Feb. 19, 2016 to investigate the shooting death of Kavozia Walker, who suffered a fatal gunshot wound to the neck. The subsequent investigation found the individual responsible for the death was 30-year-old Brandon Levi Williams. Investigators from the Douglas…