On October 13, 2006, around 9:30 a.m., Chief Investigator Ben Nix of the Miller County Sheriff’’s Department was called by School Resources Officer Melanie Diamond.
Officer Diamond informed Investigator Nix that Miller County High School Principal Ginger Webster, Middle School Principal Frank Killingsworth and she had located a quantity of suspected marijuana from a student at school and needed it tested.
Investigator Nix arrived at Miller County Middle School and spoke with principals Webster, Killingsworth, and SRO Diamond.
There was one juvenile in custody, and Investigator Nix field tested the substance. It tested positive for marijuana. The marijuana was very fresh and had been picked within the last 24 hours.
Investigator Nix contacted Sheriff “Buddy” Glass and Chief Deputy Terry Williams and told them of the discovery.
Chief Deputy Williams came to the school and went to the juvenile’s residence.
Officers were given permission to search the house by the juvenile’s parent.
Sgt. Dale Glover, K-9 Officer for Miller County, was called in along with his K-9, Riser.
While searching the house, Riser and Sgt. Glover located several places where marijuana was hidden in the juvenile’s bedroom.
While the search was ongoing, Investigator Nix was contacted by School Resources Officer Shane Rathel, who informed them that he had another juvenile in custody who had purchased marijuana from the other juvenile and had it with him. All evidence was taken into custody and photographed.
Both juveniles were arrested. The first was charged with possession with intent, sale of a controlled substance in a public school, and sale of marijuana.
The second was charged with possession of marijuana and possession of a controlled substance in a public school.
The Miller County School Officials and School Resource Officers did an outstanding job with restraining the sale of this illegal substance.
After the investigation, it was discovered that the incidents had only been happening for one day. It was isolated quickly by the school officials and school resource officers.

We are proud to announce that the Miller County Liberal now has a PhD employed with us. I begged Dr. Jones to help me write up this great accomplishment, but no luck. She isn't too much on blowing her own horn.
For the past 27 or more years, Debra C. Jones has worked with us getting out the Miller County Liberal. She was first hired as a typesetter, but we quickly discovered she had many talents.
This editor/publisher wouldn't even consider her when she first applied since she was a qualified English teacher and much, much over-qualified for what we could afford to pay her, and I told her just that.
However, my baby daughter, Donna, who was also one of Debra’s former students and one of her very good friends, called me to plead with me to hire her. Debra stated that she didn't think she was going back to the teaching profession and wanted to give journalism a try. While employed at Albany High School, she was the sponsor of the school newspaper as well as the journalism teacher and had enjoyed working with the students to produce the monthly newspaper.
Thank goodness, I took Donna's advice, and the then petite young lady continued to learn the newspaper business just like I was attempting to when she came to work with us on August 17, 1979. Debra had one young daughter, Christy Gray, 7, when she started working with us. Like our grandchildren, Christy was reared a good portion of her young life at the Liberal, got ink in her blood, and her first two jobs out of college were as a graphic artist for newspapers, starting with the News Herald in Panama City Beach, FL, and later switching to the Tallahassee Democrat.
When I hired, Debra she assured me that she had no intentions of having any more children and would stay with us forever. The best of intentions don't always work out. Eleven years later and 18 years after the birth of her first child, Debra and Jeff, her husband at the time, were blessed with my godchild, Joy Jones, who was also reared partially at the Liberal along with my grandchildren. They all call me Papa. In fact, Joy took her first fire call when she was about six months old. I was baby-sitting while her mother was at a meeting, and the call came in. Away the baby and I went to cover the story and help put out the fire.
Over the years, Debra had been continually going back to college to get more master’s degrees and said she wanted to work on her doctorate, a lifelong dream. She has a insatiable desire to learn and is quite good at it. As much as I hated to lose her as a full-time employee, I agreed that she wasn't getting any younger, and she might ought to get on with it.
Since July 10, 1998, on her birthday, Debra has been a part-time employee of the Liberal. She got her a job as a professor at Bainbridge College and later at an Albany college. She had completed her course work for her doctorate’s and began writing her dissertation while teaching and continuing to proofread for the Liberal. A long eight years later, she finally finished that dissertation and got it approved by her committee at Florida State University last April. For several weeks now, I have been asking Debra about how she was progressing on her PhD. As I was riding back from a Tifton softball tournament with Debra and Joy, Debra admitted that she had graduated back in August and is now officially a Doctor of Philosophy.
I begged her to write this article about her now being addressed as Dr. Jones. That didn't go over too well, so I have done the best I can to let everyone who reads this newspaper know the good news for one of my employees.
Debra is more like one of my daughters than one who works with us.
She is one of the most talented people that I know with the English language. She is a loving mother, a better newspaper person than "ye scribe," a great writer, an author, a wonderful teacher, both at our church and in higher learning institutions. I am as proud of her as if she were my own daughter and proud to call her my friend. Debra and her girls are family to my family.
Congratulations, Dr. Debra C. Jones!

A one vehicle accident occurred on SR 91 north of Colquitt, Thursday, October 12, at approximately 9:30 a.m.
According to the incident report, Thomas Edward Harvey, 36, of old GA Hwy. 3, Camilla, was traveling west on SR 91 in a 2000 International semi truck with a large load of logs. Both the log truck and a witness, Sidney Reynolds, of Old Airport Road, were traveling in the same direction.
The driver of the log truck attempted to pass the vehicle of the witness prior to reaching the marked passing lane. Mr. Reynolds was attempting to turn left on the Old Airport Road.
The driver of the log truck lost control of his vehicle and skidded 387 feet traveling on the south shoulder of SR 91 before overturning and losing his load of logs. The area of impact was on the south shoulder of GA Hwy. 91.
The contributing factors causing the one vehicle accident was listed as traveling on the wrong side of the road and driver lost control.
The Miller County Sheriff’’s Department, along with the Miller County Ambulance Service and the Colquitt/Miller County Fire and Rescue Service, was called to the scene.
The driver of the log truck was taken in by ambulance to the Miller County Hospital for observation and treatment of visible injuries.
The vehicle sustained extensive damage.
Georgia State Patrol officer SGT. C. M. Godby was the investigating officer.
The driver of the log truck was cited for failure to maintain lane.
Witness Sidney Reynolds stated that it could have been much worse. He said that the log truck had been following him very closely for quite a distance.
"Just a few seconds’ difference, and I would have been under that log truck or under that load of logs," Reynolds stated.

On Thursday, October 12, eight exhibitors from Miller County traveled to Perry with 16 hogs to compete in the Georgia National Fair Junior Swine Show. The event hosted a record number of swine as over 1100 entries were exhibited in the show. The Miller County show team enjoyed a very successful weekend as some of our exhibitors excelled in both showmanship and in their respective classes. Highlights of the exhibitors’ success were the dominating showmanship skills of Paige Godfrey, Katie Cofty, Taylor, Brooke and Jonathon Widner. Jonathon Widner also exhibited the overall Reserve Grand Champion Market Gilt and sister, Brooke Widner exhibited the Division 2 Champion Barrow. Both of these hogs were raised by the Widner family. Congratulations go to all of the exhibitors for a very impressive showing. Complete results for the Miller County exhibitors at the Georgia National Fair Hog Show are as follows:
Breeding Gilt Showmanship:
12th Grade – Paige Godfrey (Second Overall Showman)
5th Grade – Katie Cofty (Eighth Overall Showman)
Market Hog Showmanship
12th Grade – Jonathon Widner (Second Overall Showman)
10th Grade – Brooke Widner (First Overall Showman)
4th Grade – Taylor Widner (Second Overall Showman)
Breeding Gilt Show
Jonathon Widner – Second Place (Commercial Gilt Weight Class)
Paige Godfrey – Sixth Place (Purebred Spotted Swine)
Daniel Allen – Sixth Place (Purebred Yorkshire)
Heather Butler – Ninth Place (Purebred Yorkshire)
Zac Taylor – Ninth Place (Purebred Yorkshire)
Katie Cofty – 10th Place (Commercial Gilt Weight Class)
Market Hog Show
Jonathon Widner – First Place Class 23; Reserve Champion Division 5;
Overall Reserve Grand Champion Market Gilt;
Third Place Barrow Class 4
Brooke Widner – First Place Class 4; Champion Division 2 Barrow;
Sixth Place Barrow Class 21
Taylor Widner – Second Place Class 20 Market Gilt; Sixth Place Class 6 Market Barrow
Zac Taylor – 10th Place Class 21 Market Gilts.
Congratulations to all of our fine youth in this program.

Week of October 15, 2006