Fayette headlines, school news, photos

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Fayette area photos

The head of Fayette County’s elections office is spending much of his time this week dispelling rumors and answering calls from misinformed voters concerned that pending lawsuits will disrupt the July primary. They won’t. “I’ve been on the phone constantly,” Tom Sawyer, Fayette County’s Board of Elections director, said Wednesday, the first day for candidates to officially enter this year’s races.

Cherokee County's River Ridge High School is one of 240 schools in the nation to receive the Yearbook of Excellence Award from Jostens Yearbooks. The award recognizes yearbook staffs for creating an inclusive yearbook, generating school engagement and successfully managing the yearbook creation process.

Emily Lam of SKA Academy in Duluth and Raquel Charles of Sequoyah High School in Cherokee County have received National PTA Reflections Outstanding Interpretation awards. Emily won for visual arts and Raquel won for dance choreography. Winners are chosen in six arts categories along with 188 awards of excellence and merit.

Foreclosure notices in metro Atlanta during May held steady, avoiding both the longed-for decline and a feared second wave of rising numbers. “Things are very consistent right now,” said Barry Bramlett, the CEO of Equity Depot, the Kennesaw-based real estate analysis firm that gathers the data.

A former Army captain from Fayetteville was arraigned Tuesday in federal court in Atlanta on charges that he and an accomplice stole more than $2.7 million from the U.S. government while serving in Saudi Arabia. Jasen Minter, 41, faces conspiracy and theft charges.

A Peachtree City woman was arrested Thursday on a bigamy charge and faces up to 10 years if convicted. Lucy Caudill, 39, was taken into custody on one count of felony bigamy and one count of second-degree forgery. Police said "a concerned citizen" reported Caudill to authorities.

Ten-year-old Sydney Fialkow is the winner of the National Uncle Ben’s Beginner’s contest! The fifth grader at the Epstein School in Atlanta won $20,000 and a $50,000 cafeteria makeover for her school. She was named the grand prize winner of the cooking and nutrition contest after more than 700 videos submissions and 45,000 votes.

The federal appeals court in Atlanta has thrown out a $250,000 punitive damage award against Hustler magazine for publishing nude photographs of wrestler Chris Benoit's late wife. An Atlanta jury originally awarded $19.6 million in punitive damages to the estate of Nancy Benoit, but a judge reduced that to $250,000.

After realizing her office was under investigation for practicing medicine without a license, a 28-year-old woman moved her business to another metro county, police say. But now, Kristie Michelle Johnson is behind bars in Douglas County following her arrest Friday by Douglasville police.

Fayette County teachers Sean Bennett and Gwin Jordan figure they’ve taught more than 4,000 kids combined in their 25 years in the southside school district. Over the years, they’ve weathered pay cuts and other hits to their wallets without much complaint.

Chief Judge William F. Lee Jr. of the Coweta Judicial Circuit, one of Georgia's longest serving Superior Court judges, announced Thursday he will step down from the bench in the face of investigation by the state's judicial watchdog agency. In a letter to Gov.

A second person has been arrested and charged in connection with a video gambling operation at a Fayetteville gift shop, police said Tuesday. Sameer Syed, of Peachtree City, turned himself in at the Fayette County Jail on Monday after warrants for his arrest were obtained, police said.

Two teams from Duluth's Notre Dame Academy placed third and fifth at the Odyssey of the Mind state tournament. Team “Weird Science” coached by Susan Burns and Ken Lemons, placed third in their division. Fourth grade team members: Catherine Grace Sigman, Diana Robles and Elizabeth Slack, Kate Lemons, Madison Colletta and Stephanie Delancey.

A 13-year-old west Georgia boy died Friday afternoon after falling 25 feet at the Peachtree City-Falcon Field Airport. Investigators believe Austin Bailey, of Temple, climbed onto the roof of the main hangar and stepped onto a skylight, Capt. Rosanna Dove with the Peachtree City Police Department said in a news release.

With spring here and native wildlife more active, Peachtree City is advising residents to leave foxes alone. City Hall has received reports of fox sightings, but none involved aggressive or rabid animals. The city does not trap or remove native species living in natural areas of the community.

A group of Tyrone residents has fired back against town officials' decision to put a proposed gun shop and shooting range in a shopping center adjacent to a 350-home subdivision. Concerned Citizens of Tyrone filed a lawsuit Monday in Fayette County Superior Court seeking to stop the South Atlanta Gun Club from moving into Southampton Village, a shopping center on Ga.

Police in Fayette County visited local convenience stores last week looking for any still selling synthetic marijuana, known as “Spice.” Detective Mike Whitlow of the Fayetteville Police Department said officers found the substance at only one of the 13 stores they searched.

Thanks to a pair of eighth graders from Cobb's Durham Middle  “Georgia Month” will be celebrated in September. Gov. Nathan Deal signed a resolution this week establishing September as the month for Georgia history and character education. BethAnn Shires and Ryan Mulkey came up with the idea of honoring the character and accomplishments of the state's founder, James Oglethorpe.

A Fayette County man has pleaded guilty to fraud in a scheme involving a treatment program for homeless teenage girls in Henry County. Leetra Dometric Langston, 40, was sentenced in Henry County Superior Court Wednesday to five years' probation and ordered to pay more than $20,000 in restitution for his role in a scheme involving the God's Promise Center, where he worked as intake director, said Lauren Kane, spokeswoman for the Georgia Attorney General's Office, which investigated the case.

The work of Sope Creek Elementary students Ethan Pallas, Patrick Villarreal, Yewell Volin and Avery Hill earned their East Cobb school a $5,000 grant from Lowe's Toolbox for Education. The grant will be used to create an outdoor Children's Learning Garden at the school.

He covered the Masters, Kentucky Derby and the Georgia-Georgia Tech football game more than 50 times each. Most of the Super Bowls, too. But on Sunday, the story of legendary sportswriter Furman Bisher came to an end. Bisher, 93, died of a heart attack, a longtime friend and editor told the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

Fayette County officials have put out a warning about a man posing as a county health inspector to get free meals from restaurants, Channel 2 Action News reported. The man has shown up at two restaurants in the county in the last two weeks, including a Waffle House on North Glenn Street in Fayetteville, threatening them with spot inspections if they didn’t feed him for free, officials said.

A Fayetteville man was sentenced to federal prison Thursday for attempting to smuggle more than $100,000 in cash through Hartsfield-Jackson International airport, the U.S. Attorney's Office announced. Stephen Willoughby, 37, who was convicted in January of bulk cash smuggling, was sentenced to 1 year 9 months in prison plus three years of supervised release.

The assistant fire chief for Peachtree City has retired following an investigation into an alleged groping incident at an awards dinner. Peki Prince submitted her notice of retirement March 6, a day before an attorney released the findings of an internal investigation in the allegations, according to a statement from the city.

Creekview High School Beta Club members Lizzie Perrin and Abigail Sherrod took top honors in the statewide Beta Club Scholastic Competition. Lizzie won second place for creative writing; and Abigail won first place for special talent (opera). The Cherokee County students now move to the national competition in North Carolina in June.