8. I can't get into that, but that's what we're looking at.". He had just gotten $20 from an ATM machine and thought they wanted to rob him. (She had allegedly sold an undercover officer $50 worth of cocaine.) Select the best result to find their address, phone number, relatives, and public records. | A federal jury in Gainesville, Ga., said a reasonable officer would have realized that Ayers' Narcotics officer Frank Baggett, Jr. said that when he kicked down the door to Dixons bedroom, he stumbledwhich caused his gun to go off and sent a bullet into Dixons chest. A similar tragedy occurred in San Jose, Calif. on February 17, 2004, when plainclothes officers were attempting to serve a warrant for a drug-related parole violation and 43-year-old Rodolfo Cardenas, a father of five, had the misfortune of being in the wrong place at the wrong time. Smith, Junnier and Tesler faced a variety of charges from both the federal government and the state of Georgia. Wanis Thonetheva, thats the person I blame in all this. The black-and-white video shows a dark Escalade pulling past some gas pumps and two men getting out. Once the publicity hit, Harrison was suspended. Ayers widow, Abby In fact, the 75-year-old minister was a substance abuse counselor in Boston and had a long history of doing good work in that citys African-American community. Attorneys for the city of New York agreed to pay $1.6 million to Spruills family. In September 2009, Johnathan Ayers, a 28-year-old Baptist pastor from Lavonia, Ga., was gunned down by a North Georgia narcotics task force in the parking lot of a gas station. According to a 1,100-page Georgia Bureau of Investigation report made public after the Dec. 15-18 grand jury probe, undercover officers were in the process of purchasing crack cocaine from a known drug user in hopes of identifying her supplier. Same illogical cowardice outlawing hemp candy or shooting At an inquest, a predominantly white jury decided that the shooting was accidental and that Baggett should not be charged with anything. The defense said Harrison has only a $1 million insurance policy through Stephens County. The two outside prosecutors were asked by Rickman to review the case and talk to the grand jury about the case and the law. He put his car in reverse and attempted to escape. Harris fired twice at the fleeing vehicle, grazing Ayers on the arm and striking him in the torso. But instead of apprehending her at the motel, they instead followed Ayers, the stranger they'd just seen give her a ride and hand her some cash. But the raid itself was conducted by the Habersham County Special Response Team. Had war on drugs supporters learned a lesson from Navarros death, it is quite possible that the killings of the Rev. And all three of them pled guilty to federal charges of conspiracy to violate her civil rights. The wasteful use of public resources to pursue a petty drug offender and the aggressive and short-sighted apprehension of Jonathan Ayers that led to his death are bad enough. The law cited by the grand jury states in part that a person who uses threats or force in defense of self or others is immune from criminal prosecution. But Ayers had no way of knowing he wasnt being attacked by carjackers or gang members; in fact, the officers who killed him went out of their way to look as thuggish and intimidating as possible. 3.1.2023 7:00 AM, Charles Oliver They followed the car as Ayers dropped the woman off at a gas station. In September 2009, the The Georgia Bureau of Investigation (GBI) is looking into the shooting. The 18-person grand jury was provided with the Georgia Bureau of Investigations case file on the shooting, which contained more than 1,000 pages, as well as 26 compact discs of interviews, photos and 911 recordings. According to the originally filed civil complaint, Harrison later claimed he shot the victim because, at the time, he thought Ayers had killed one of his partners in the parking lot. Stephens County sheriff Randy Shirley has placed both officers involved in the incident on paid administrative leave, he said. A lawyer representing Ayers' widow told the Toccoa Record he was disappointed by the grand jury's decision and that a civil lawsuit would follow. Published: Jul. ------------------------------------------. A 34-year-old Snellville woman has been identified as the victim of a fatal shooting that occurred at her place of employment in the Centerville area on Friday. Wilsons one-year-old child was also shot but survived, although one of his fingers needed to be amputated. Ayers maintained a blog, in which he wrote that he had three loves in life: "Jesus Christ, my wife Abby, and the Church.". Harrison was ordered to post a $2.9 million bond while his attorneys appeal this most recent judgment. A national expert on police shootings was consulted. Web0:15. District Attorney Brian Rickman praised the Georgia Bureau of Investigation for going to "very extraordinary lengths" to insure the investigation into the shooting was fair. AlthoughChavalia was acquitted of criminal charges, Wilsons family was awarded $2.5 million in 2010 in a civil lawsuit against the city of Lima. Harrison fired shots, and one struck Ayers in the abdomen. "The vigilantes will get their justice, hopefully, in civil court. Mario Paz; El Monte, California, 1999. Posthumously, Navarro was proven innocent, and his senseless death underscored the need for the United States to seriously reform its misguided drug laws. Its also a bit much to call Thonetheva a terrorist shortly after his own officers have just burned a baby. Chavalia later said he thought shots were coming from that bedroom, but the fact that he killed an unarmed woman holding a baby was inexcusable, especially in light of the fact that Wilson, according to her sister Tania Wilson, was not involved in drug sales herself. The officers claim they spotted Ayers dropping off a woman they were investigating as detectives in a multi-county drug task force. Despite the fact that Harrison had killed a man suspected of no crime months earlier without having undergone lethal-force training and certification, the officer was still carrying his badge and gun up until the time of the WSBTV report. All they care about is making money. Officer Billy Shane Harrison then opened fire, shooting Ayers in the stomach. Heres when your childs school will get one. And he continues to get anonymous messages, including the Christmas card depicting Hell. Her lawsuit claims that the officers decision to wait until he returned to his car and then - in video captured on a surveillance camera - speed to a stop beside him and jump out of a black SUV wearing plain clothes with weapons drawn would cause a reasonable person to assume they were not police but criminals. Barley didnt speak during the brief arraignment hearing. Subscribe to Reason Roundup, a wrap up of the last 24 hours of news, delivered fresh each morning. By the time Billy Shane Harrison received the Christmas card depicting Hell, he was numb to the damnation he had endured since he pulled the trigger and killed a fleeing man on Sept. 1. Police later determined what they had seen was not a drug transaction, but "other circumstances were involved, and that's part of the investigation," Bankhead said. Mellontree, in a 1992 interview, told the New York Times: People cant accept the idea that a 84-year-old grandmother gets shot in her bed, and its not even worth a negligence charge.. But the kicker has to be that the subsequent police-led investigations of this high-profile case failed to turn up such a critical piece of information. The pastor may have fled the police, the grand jury concluded, because he feared his reputation would be ruined if his relationship with Barrett were exposed. But no good deed goes unpunished, and on March 25, 1994, Williams efforts to help a substance abuser led to his death. So maybe we should take Rickmans quick assessment of this weeks raid with a grain of salt. Neither the family or Mrs. Ayers have embraced any of this, attorney Richard Hendrix said. Below are 10 innocent victims who became collateral damage and lost their lives in the war on drugs (there are many, many more). "How does a young man, who does so many wonderful things, have a dark side that wound up getting him killed?" But a lot more shooting was done by the officers: a total of 39 shots were fired, several of which hit her. Idexx Laboratories Inc. Chief Executive Officer Jonathan Ayers is taking a medical leave of absence following what the company said was a serious bicycling accident on June 27. He said the panel that convened this week was charged with deciding only whether the case should go to a separate grand jury for possible criminal prosecution. They were in plain clothes. Copyright 2023 Salon.com, LLC. In a lawsuit filed last week, Abigail Ayers makes some astonishing new allegations about the competence of the police officers who killed her husband, the supervisors who hired them, and the law enforcement agencies and the grand jury that investigated Ayers' death. Lgende: Administrateurs, Les Brigades du Tigre, Les retraits de la Brigade, 726791 message(s) 35337 sujet(s) 30093 membre(s) Lutilisateur enregistr le plus rcent est jocer, Quand on a un tlviseur avec TNT intgre, Quand on a un tlviseur et un adaptateur TNT, Technique et technologie de la tlvision par cble, Rglement du forum et conseils d'utilisation. Ayers' sister did not return a call from CNN Thursday. The badges they had hanging from their necks, seen in this photo, were far from conspicuous. The Narks are murderers for shooting an innocent preacher, You trying to justify it only shows how weak some Georgia citizens are. Review & Giveaway: What Do We Do When Nobody is Listening? Bob Allen is managing editor of Associated Baptist Press. Ayers, who was white, had a reputation for being the type of Christian who didnt spend all of his time on a soap box preaching about sin and salvationhe actually put his money where his mouth was, became active in his community, and did things to help people. It was refreshing to hear an attorney general make those statements; also encouraging is a recent Rasmussen poll finding that 82% of Americans see the war on drugs as a failure. | They first said he was part of their drug investigation all along, then retracted. I'm thinking of Dustin Pigeon, Andrew Thomas, Daniel Shaver and Jonathan Ayers. A cafeteria-style restaurant leads this list of 12 popular spots, SPONSORED: See the Great Smoky Mountains in style. Jonathan Ayers, 28, was shot Sept. 1, 2009, in WebThe Springville Police Department announced Monday that Jonathan Hamilton was the man killed in Springvilles fourth fatal shooting of the past month. One of the people he had been helping was a woman who had a history of problems. If the story ended there, it would merely be enough to boil your blood. document.getElementById( "ak_js_1" ).setAttribute( "value", ( new Date() ).getTime() ); This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. When they broke in, Johnston (who lived alone in a high-crime area of the city and kept a gun in her house for protection) assumed she was being the victim of a home invasion and fired a shot. She prohibited him from possessing weapons or consuming alcohol if released from jail. That substance abuser was a police informant who gave Boston narcotics officers the address of an alleged drug dealer who lived in the same building as Williams, but a SWAT team raided the wrong apartmentWilliams apartmentand after being violently shoved onto the ground and handcuffed, the minister began to vomit. TOCCOA, Ga. (ABP) A grand jury has cleared police officers involved in a Sept. 1 shooting that killed a Southern Baptist pastor caught in the middle of a botched drug sting. You've just returned to your car after getting cash from an ATM. Jonathan Ayers, Rodolfo Rudy Cardenas, Alberta Spruill, Mario Paz, Kathryn Johnston and others could have been prevented. They followed him to a gas station where he stopped to withdraw money from an ATM machine. He wasnt authorized to make arrests or to carry a gun. WebOne man is dead and a second person was sent to the hospital after a shooting in Treme on Tuesday, Oct. 12. Dixon, who was a paraplegic and was battling pneumonia, was in her bedroom when narcotics officers raided her home at 2am; an informant claimed he had bought drugs from Dixons granddaughter. "The unfortunate thing for me is people who claim to be forgiven by God are unwilling to forgive others," Franklin said. The Bible says an eye for an eye, one reader wrote the Toccoa Record. And not too many cases were it's obvious the shooting was bad or even unnecessary. Reproduction of material from any Salon pages without written permission is strictly prohibited. Whether youre a lifelong resident of D.C. or you just moved here, weve got you covered. A jury awarded Abigail Ayers $2.3 million, but a judge reduced the amount to $1.64 million after reassessing lost wages. Individuals arrested and charged in complaints are presumed innocent unless or until proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt in court. The pastor, understandably, attempted to escape. When the grand jury exonerated Harrison and Oxner on Dec. 15, the controversy flared anew. Wilson, a single mother, had been romantically involved with a suspected drug dealer named Anthony Terry (who later pled guilty to selling drugs). ATLANTA, Georgia (CNN) -- A north Georgia pastor was shot to death by police when he struck an officer with his car after he was seen in a vehicle with a drug suspect, authorities told CNN. Jonathan Ayers was a pastor at the Shoal Creek Baptist Church. Some contend Ayers was running because he didn't want the police to expose a secret part of his life: Barrett told investigators that she and Ayers had been having an affair for years. This would have been a grossly disproportionate way for these cops to have approached Barrett, their actual suspect, much less a guy they sought to question only about the 10 minutes he'd just spent in the car with her. Let's say that you (which would include 99 percent of the people reading this) aren't a drug dealer, or a mobster, or some other sort of career criminal. Associated Press articles: Copyright 2016 The Associated Press. From there he was taken to a hospital where he later died from massive blood loss. Would you like to have the day's news stories delivered right to your inbox every evening? One of the bullets reportedly grazed one of the victims. ", The incident was caught on the gas station's surveillance camera. Armed agents dressed in street clothes then rushed Ayerss car. WebIn February, I posted about a settlement in the death of Jonathan Ayers, an innocent pastor that this same drug task force killed in a drug operation in 2009. But with the war on drugs, the concept of innocent until proven guilty has fallen by the wayside on countless occasions. Based on that finding, jurors said officers involved in the incident "would be immune from criminal prosecution" under Georgia law. "They will suffer the consequences.". When they approached to question him, Ayers reportedly tried to flee and his car struck one of the officers. WebLOGAN A 29-year-old Ogden man has been arrested for allegedly shooting at a group of teenagers in Providence Canyon. When Ayers left a gas station/convenience store after using an ATM and saw three plainclothes officers pointing their guns at him, he had no idea they were cops. WebShooting a commercial for emagine theater that will be played at every theater across the country before every movie they play..awesome Jump to Sections of this page Pedro Oregon Navarro; Houston, Texas, 1998. The war on drugs is not only fought aggressively, it is fought carelessly and haphazardly, and a long list of innocent victims have been killed or maimed in the process. It was WWII. In the end, the jury decided the shooting was justified. CNN's Carolina Sanchez contributed to this report. Rumors continue to feed the fire. According to Bankhead, Ayers then put the car into drive, and another officer fired into the car, hitting Ayers, because he thought his life was in danger. Local citizens held several vigils calling for a complete investigation into the police shooting. 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