This originally ran in The Tennessean on April 24. You can view the article in its original form by accessing the archives of The Tennessean (subscription required).

Amanda Gambill
The Tennessean

A former Humphreys County sheriff’s deputy filed a motion Tuesday in U.S. District Court in Nashville to dismiss all charges against him in a police brutality case.

James Benjamin “Benji” Lee’s counsel, Assistant Federal Public Defenders Isaiah S. Gant and Dumaka Shabazz, filed the motion, citing that because the Federal Public Defenders office must close on Fridays — a result of the federal sequestration of funds  — Lee is not receiving appropriate counsel.

Because of reduced funding through sequestration, the Federal Public Defenders office decided that it must furlough the lawyers in its office for one day each week through the end of the fiscal year on Sept. 30.

Through the motion, those public defenders argue that Lee has “80 percent of the counsel he had for his first trial” and the United States (in the U.S. Attorney’s office and the Department of Justice) is at “100 percent strength.” They argue this “unfairly tips the scales against Mr. Lee.”

Lee was a co-defendant in a trial that resulted in a hung jury and was declared a mistrial by U.S. District Judge Todd Campbell when a jury couldn’t agree on whether he and Timothy Hedge, a former sheriff’s deputy, who both severely kicked and beat an unarmed man with a metal baton, were guilty of police brutality. The trial is rescheduled for May 7.

The motion accuses the United States of violating Lee’s fundamental rights to counsel, due process and equal protection for “failing to fully fund counsel.”

“There is no such thing as a ‘partial right to counsel’ or ‘2/3 of a right to counsel’ or ‘4/5 of a right to counsel’ or any other fraction thereof,” the public defenders argue in the motion. “Under the Constitution, it is all or nothing.”

Hedge faces the same charges, but his privately retained counsel is “no way impinged upon by the sequestration of funds,” the motion reads. Lee’s counsel argues that there is no “reasonable justification … in allowing identical accused to face trail on identical charges, while hampering the defense of one accused but not the other.”

 

Amanda Gambill is with the Seigenthaler News Service — MTSU. She can be reached at amandafgambill@gmail.com

This originally ran in The Tennessean on April 18. You can view the article in its original form by accessing the archives of The Tennessean (subscription required).

By Amanda Gambill
The Tennessean

A class action lawsuit in U.S. District Court in Nashville continued Wednesday with bartender-dancers accusing Coyote Ugly Saloon Development Corporation, Coyote Ugly Saloon Nashville and an executive of denying them overtime pay.

The lawsuit, involving 37 current and former employees of Coyote Ugly nationwide and 10 former employees of the Coyote Ugly Saloon in Nashville, accuses the themed bars of failing to pay them for work performed off-the-clock. The lawsuit also accuses CUSDC of having an illegal tip pool because security guards were allowed to take five percent from gross tip receipts.

The defense argues that the security guards played an important role in the overall atmosphere of the bars, and that they were also responsible for assisting customers and the bartenders, sometimes even filling the role as “barback” to change beer kegs, stock bars and clean counters. In the instances that the guards did perform barback duties, they actually took 10 percent from the overall tips.

The activities at Coyote Ugly saloons involve scantily-clad female bartenders dancing on the 100-foot-long bar and allowing clientele to drink shots of alcohol from their bodies. The female patrons are encouraged to do likewise.

Misty Blu Stewart, a former bartender-dancer from Nashville who initiated the suit, and Sarah Stone, a former bartender-dancer of the Oklahoma City Coyote Ugly, are seeking damages for “retaliation” that occurred because of their involvement in the suit.

Stewart testified Wednesday that she was “ashamed” and “extremely embarrassed” when Liliana Lovell, CEO of CUSDC, wrote a blog post shortly after learning about the lawsuit on her blog, “Lil Spill,” that appears on Coyote Ugly’s website and referred to Stewart in a derogatory fashion, using vulgar words and calling her names.

Lovell testified Wenesday that she was upset when she wrote the post because this was “the third time” that Stewart had tried to bring legal action against Coyote Ugly.

But Stewart’s name does not appear in the blog post.

Stone also testified Wednesday that she quit her job because then regional manager Daniel Huckaby posted a Facebook status when he was “three feet away” from her that asked God to keep him from “killing the girl” trying to sue him.

Huckaby, director of operations for CUSDC, testified Wednesday that he was intoxicated on the night of the Facebook post.

“I honestly don’t remember it at all,” he said.

CUSDC owns and operates Coyote Ugly Saloons in at least Tennessee, Colorado, Texas, Louisiana, Nevada, Oklahoma, Wisconsin and Florida.

This originally ran in The Tennessean on April 8. You can view the article in its original form by accessing the archives of The Tennessean (subscription required).

Amanda Gambill
The Tennessean

A man was sentenced Monday in U.S. District Court in Nashville to three-and-a-half months in federal prison, one year in a halfway house and three years of supervised release for bank robbery.

Ralph Patrick McMahon, in his mid-sixties, robbed Wilson Bank and Trust in Watertown of approximately $2,600 in December 2011. When law enforcement officers spotted his fleeing vehicle and turned on their sirens, McMahon did not stop, but rather accelerated to 100 mph, according to the affidavit. After stopping officers stopped him with a “pit maneuver,” McMahon began to flee on foot with the stolen money.

“I’d just like to say I’m sorry about all this; I still wonder why I even came to this,” McMahon said Monday to the court.

McMahon was sentenced on the low end of the federal sentencing guidelines because he suffers from “serious mental health issues,” such as post-traumatic stress disorder, resulting from his service in the Vietnam War, Chief U.S. District Judge William J. Haynes said at the sentencing for McMahon.

Haynes recommended for McMahon to receive mental health treatment, substance abuse treatment and psychiatric care while incarcerated.

Amanda Gambill is with the Seigenthaler News Service — MTSU. She can be reached at amandafgambill@gmail.com.

This originally ran in The Tennessean on April 3. You can view the article in its original form by accessing the archives of The Tennessean (subscription required).

Amanda Gambill
The Tennessean

The organizer of a Murfreesboro drug robbery scheme pleaded guilty Tuesday in U.S. District Court in Nashville to conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute five or more kilograms of cocaine.

Xavier “X” Farmer, 24, conspired with three others to rob a home in Murfreesboro of cocaine in December 2012. The other defendants in the case have already pleaded guilty and are awaiting sentencing. A fifth man involved in the scheme turned out to an undercover drug agent.  

After expressing apprehension about the plan, Farmer and his three friends decided to let their fifth associate — the undercover operative — rob the home and then they would rob the agent.

The undercover agent was with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. After he made audio recordings of his dealings with the other four men, ATF agents arrested them at a self-storage unit during final preparations for the robbery. Three loaded firearms were found during the arrest.

According to the lawyer for the government, Farmer also sold cocaine and crack cocaine to the undercover agent multiple times.

Farmer is the father of four children ranging from three months old to four years old.

His sentencing is scheduled for August 9.

 

Amanda Gambill is with Siegenthaler News Service – MTSU. She can be reached at amandafgambill@gmail.com.

This originally ran in The Tennessean on April 2. You can view the article in its original form by accessing the archives of The Tennessean (subscription required).

Amanda Gambill
The Tennessean

A police brutality case was declared a mistrial in U.S. District Court in Nashville after a jury could not agree whether two Humphreys County sheriff’s deputies who severely beat an unarmed man were guilty.

After two days of deliberation, six men and six women of the jury came to a standstill on whether James Benjamin “Benji” Lee and Timothy Wayne Hedge crossed a line when they beat, kick and struck Darrin Ring with a metal baton outside his friend’s home in 2011. Six members of the jury believed the officers to be guilty, five believed they were not guilty and one was undecided.

An extraordinarily violent video of the episode—from the police car dashboard camera— went viral shortly after the incident and is widely viewed on YouTube.  

The deputies responded to a “shots fired” call and encountered Ring outside his friend’s house.

The defense lawyers for the deputies argued throughout the case that Ring was an initial threat at the incident because he wouldn’t take his hands out of his pocket on that cold, snowy night.

But Ring testified Thursday that he removed his hands from his pockets, then put his hands back in his pockets to pull out the lining to show they were empty. Then he put his hands back in his pockets to put the lining back, and then he placed his hands behind his back.

Ring acknowledged that he was under the influence of marijuana and Xanax at the time of the incident.

The defense lawyers argued Ring was a threat to the officers because he kicked the first officer on the scene, James McCord, in the groin, poked his eye and tried to grab Lee’s weapon. But McCord later testified that he was not sure of his recollection.

Ring testified Thursday that while he was being tackled, he raised his hands to break his fall. After he was tackled, he was pepper-sprayed by Lee.

The prosecution argued during closing statement Friday that “a naked, restrained man lying on the frozen ground” didn’t pose a threat to the officers.

Waverly city policeman Joe Parnell was called for backup to use a stun gun on Ring because deputies are not provided with stun guns. Ring was hit by the stun gun at least five times by Parnell as the other officers repeatedly ordered Ring to roll over on his stomach.

After being tasered, Ring was hit with a metal baton repeatedly by Lee and kicked multiple times by Hedge.

By the time the altercation ended, Ring was shackled and taken to jail, where he remained for six months. The charges against Ring were subsequently dismissed, and he was released.

Lee, Hedge and McCord have been fired from the sheriff’s department, and Parnell has resigned from the Waverly Police Department because of the incident.

“This was not a life and death struggle for the defendants; this was a life and death situation for Darrin Ring,” said Adriana Vieco, an attorney for the Department of Justice, in closing arguments.

 “They had no idea (about being recorded) because if they did, we probably wouldn’t be here today,” she said Friday.

The case is rescheduled for May 7.

Amanda Gambill is with the Seigenthaler News Service — MTSU. She can be reached at amandafgambill@gmail.com

This originally ran in The Tennessean on April 2. You can view the article in its original form by accessing the archives of The Tennessean (subscription required).

Amanda Gambill
The Tennessean

A Nashville woman pleaded guilty Monday in U.S. District Court to giving false statements to the government to qualify for grants and misappropriating about $360,000 public money.

Birdie Mae Anderson, 54, applied for a grant of about $80,600 in 2006 from the Department of Veteran Affairs to buy property in Nashville to provide housing for homeless veterans. She claimed to the VA that she already had a certain amount of funds to purchase the property, which was a specific condition to receive the grant, according to the indictment.

About a year later, in May 2007, Anderson applied for and received a mortgage of $75,000, but she had falsely claimed that she had a monthly income of $5,250 and that she had a “vested interest in a retirement fund” of $80,600 so she could qualify for the loan, the indictment claims.

Using the loan and the grant — a fact she did not tell the VA — she bought the property. She also didn’t tell the VA that she had retained to herself $25,600 of the grant. She has subsequently lost the house to foreclosure.

In December 2007, Anderson knowingly converted $280,000 of additional federal grant money to her own use. That money was supposed to be used to buy a specialty van and property to benefit the veterans. It wasn’t.

Sentencing is scheduled for June 17.

Amanda Gambill is with the Seigenthaler News Service — MTSU. She can be reached at amandafgambill@gmail.com.

This originally ran in The Tennessean on March 29. You can view the article in its original form by accessing the archives of The Tennessean (subscription required).

Amanda Gambill
The Tennessean

A man severely beaten by two Humphreys County sheriff’s officers testified Thursday in U.S. District Court in Nashville that “I’d done nothing wrong and I was wondering why they were doing what they were doing to me.”

“I didn’t want to go to jail, and I didn’t do nothing wrong,” Darrin Ring, 37, said during testimony in the trial of two Humphreys County sheriff’s deputies who sent him to the emergency room with broken bones and a punctured lung after kicking, striking and hitting him with a metal baton outside a friend’s home in January 2011.

The government lawyers said Wednesday that Ring was visiting a couple who left him at their residence when they decided to go get dinner with their children. Ring testified that he believed he didn’t have enough gas in his car to go home so he was unable to leave when the couple left.

Ring testified he thought a gunshot-like noise he heard was firecrackers because the couple’s children had been setting them off all day. But neighbors thought the sound came from a gunshot and called police.

The sheriff’s deputies, James Benjamin “Benji” Lee and Timothy Wayne Hedge, responded to a “shot fired” call at the home when they encountered Ring outside the house.

James McCord, the first officer to arrive on the scene, testified Wednesday that Ring would not take his hands out of his pants pockets when ordered, and that he tried to handcuff him, but that Ring resisted.

But Ring testified Thursday that he removed his hands from his pockets, then put his hands back in his pockets to pull out the pockets’ lining to show he had nothing in them. Then he put his hands back in his pocket to put the lining back, and then he placed his hands behind his back.

“I didn’t know what he wanted me to do with them,” Ring said in court.

According to McCord’s testimony, Ring kicked him in the groin, poked his eye and “made a move” toward Lee’s weapon, although McCord testified later that he wasn’t sure that’s what happened.

Ring testified that while he was being tackled, he raised his hands to break his fall. He added that after he was tackled, he was pepper-sprayed.

“I couldn’t see for about 10 minutes,” he said, describing the feeling as having “jalapenos” in his eyes.

Waverly city policeman Joe Parnell was called for backup to taser Ring because the sheriff’s officers are not provided with taser guns, McCord testified. Ring was then tasered at least five times by Parnell as other officers repeatedly ordered Ring to roll over on his stomach. Ring said Thursday he wasn’t sure if he heard anyone order him to roll over.

“I was almost unconscious,” Ring testified about being tasered. “It made me senseless.”

Ring said that he didn’t know during that cold, snowy night which officer was beating him, what was being used to assault him, where he was being hit or how long the incident lasted. Ring acknowledged that he was under the influence of marijuana and Xanax at the time of the incident.

 By the time the altercation ended, Ring had his clothing torn from him and he was naked, lying in the snow. He was shackled and taken to jail, where he remained for six months.

Waverly City Police Detective Jonathan Fortner, a patrol officer at the time, testified Thursday that he was Parnell’s partner that night and was the one to arrest Ring.

Fortner testified Thursday that he saw Ring naked and “lying on the ground  … on his back … with his hands in front of him.”

“I did not feel threatened,” Fornter said Thursday.

Lee, Hedge and McCord have been fired from the sheriff’s department and Parnell has resigned from the Waverly Police Department because of the incident.

Amanda Gambill is with the Seigenthaler News Service — MTSU.  She can be reached at amandafgambill@gmail.com.

 

This originally ran in The Tennessean on March 28. You can view the article in its original form by accessing the archives of The Tennessean (subscription required).

Amanda Gambill
The Tennessean

A witness to a police arrest that turned violent in Humphreys County testified Wednesday in U.S. District Court in Nashville that every time the victim “said something they (police) would hit him.”

What happened “should never have gone on,” said Ira Travis during testimony in the trial of two Humphreys County sheriff’s deputies who are accused of willfully kicking, striking and hitting Darrin Ring with a metal baton in January 2011. “A police officer should be there to protect.”

The government lawyers said that Ring was visiting a couple who left him at their residence when they decided to go get dinner with their children. According to witnesses, before leaving the house, the male in the couple allegedly fired a gun into the air.

Ring reportedly told the couple and their neighbors that evening that he was unable to leave when the couple left because his car did not have sufficient gas.

The sheriff’s deputies, James Benjamin “Benji” Lee and Timothy Wayne Hedge, responded to a “shot fired” call at the home when they encountered Ring .

The first officer on the scene that cold, snowy night was James McCord who testified that Ring would not take his hands out of his pants pockets when ordered, and that he tried to handcuff him, but that Ring resisted arrest.

McCord testified that he believed at the time that Ring kicked him in the groin and poked his eye and then “made a move” toward Lee’s weapon. In hindsight, he said, he isn’t sure that’s what happened.

However, during the ensuring struggle, McCord said that he and Ring were pepper-sprayed by Lee.

McCord said that Hedge and Lee then sat on Ring to “control” him and then began to beat him. They then called for backup from Waverly city police to taser him because the sheriff’s officers are not provided with taser guns.  Ring was then tasered at least five times by a Waverly police officer as other officers repeatedly  ordered Ring to roll over on his stomach.

McCord testified that when a person is tasered,  the body goes stiff, causing it to be unable to move or for the victim to form words.

Ira Travis, a neighbor of the couple’s house, testified that Ring “did not resist at all … he was just standing there … (the officers) were wrestling him to the ground.”

Travis said that Ring kept putting his hands in his pocket because he was cold, and that Ring never said anything threatening to officers.

David Travis, Ira’s roommate and brother, testified that Ring might have been kicking, but only to get away from three “robust” officers that were sitting on his upper body.

“How could he ‘settle down’ when he had already settled down?” David Travis said. “Take three big, robust people like them sitting on him — how you not be settled down?”

David Travis testified that he didn’t see anyone kicked in the groin and that if someone said that happened, then they are “lying.”

“The video speaks for itself; that’s all I’ve got to say,” David Travis said.

What is not contested is that Ring began the evening fully clothed and by the end of his altercation with the officers, he was handcuffed and naked and suffering broken ribs, a punctured lung and a broken shoulder. He ended the evening in a hospital emergency room.

The government said Thursday that Ring will testify that he was under the influence of drugs at the time of the incident.

Lee, Hedge and McCord have been fired from the sheriff’s department and a Waverly police officer who repeatedly tasered Ring has resigned because of the incident.

Amanda Gambill is with the Seigenthaler News Service — MTSU. She can be contacted at amandafgambill@gmail.com.

This originally ran in The Tennessean on March 27. You can view the article in its original form by accessing the archives of The Tennessean (subscription required).

Amanda Gambill
The Tennessean

An Arizona man pleaded guilty Tuesday in U.S. District Court in Nashville to conspiracy to distribute and possess with intent to distribute more than 50 kilograms of marijuana from July 2010 to December 2010.

Felix C. Ochoa, 37, was responsible for sending packages of marijuana for distribution to a co-conspirator’s workplace via FedEx, according to the affidavit. A FedEx representative told the Drug Enforcement Agency that 20 packages with the same label information shipped in the same manner had been shipped since July 2010, according to the affidavit.

He is one of four defendants involved in the conspiracy. Two have already been sentenced, and the other’s sentencing is scheduled in June.

Ochoa was arrested in January 2011 in Nashville. The investigation used a confidential informant and wiretaps to arrest the four suspects, according to the government affidavit.

The confidential informant who assisted the DEA originally came forward to the FBI with information because his family’s safety was allegedly threatened by Ochoa, the affidavit claimed.

Ochoa was also charged with two counts of distribution and possession with intent to distribute marijuana, but those charges are expected to be dismissed by the government at the sentencing because of the plea agreement.

Sentencing is scheduled for June 10.

Amanda Gambill is with the Seigenthaler News Service — MTSU. She can be reached at amandafgambill@gmail.com.

This originally ran in The Tennessean on March 22. You can view the article in its original form by accessing the archives of The Tennessean (subscription required).

Amanda Gambill
The Tennessean

A Davidson County woman was sentenced Thursday in U.S. District Court in Nashville to two years in prison, three years of supervised release and payment of  $519,000 in restitution for wire fraud and bank fraud.

Canisha Alred, 29, was one of five people in the conspiracy who defrauded Walmart stores across multiple states out of approximately $692,000 from December 2008 to early 2012. The other four have already been sentenced.

According to the indictment, a conspirator would cash a personal check to a Walmart cashier with a Post-It note signed “Customer Service Manager” with directions to accept the check as a cash transaction. According to the indictment, this would “circumvent the electronic wire verification procedure the check would normally go through.” The conspirators would then have the money (almost always $900) placed on gift cards from Walmart, which the coconspirators used at several Walmart locations.

Alred was arrested January 2012 in Nashville.

“I am truly sorry to the victims,” she said in court Thursday. “I wish I could take this back; however, I do take responsibility and I know I need to be punished … I’m so ashamed … I want to be able to show and teach [my kids] that no matter how my life turned out, they can have a better one … the path I chose is not the path for them.”

Judge Aleta A. Trauger said after the sentencing, “The court views this as a very serious crime,“ but cited Alred’s “extraordinary corporation [with the government],” in holding the sentence below the government’s request for 33 month in prison.  

Trauger also recommended for the defendant to receive mental health treatment while incarcerated.

Alred is the mother of three kids, two of which were fathered by one of the conspirators.

Amanda Gambill is with the Seigenthaler News Service — MTSU. She can be contacted at amandafgambill@gmail.com.