A narcotics agent recently resigned from the Spalding County Sheriff’s Office after the GBI completed an investigation — but before the sheriff could determine if disciplinary action was warranted.
Sheriff Darrell Dix told AJC.com that Lt. Josh Pitts did not break the law but violated policy during a May scuffle with a detained suspect, which would have led to discipline. Dix did not disclose the planned disciplinary action, but he previously told the Grip, a bi-weekly newspaper in Griffin, that Pitts would have been stripped of his lieutenant rank.
By the time Dix made his decision, Pitts was already gone.
Within three days, he had landed a job with the Butts County Sheriff’s Office, which Sheriff Gary Long defended in an emailed statement.
“Over the last seven years, I have worked with Josh from time to time,” Long said. “He has always been an honest, hard-working deputy with an outstanding record. His file, record and peers throughout the court system speaks for itself. I am very pleased to have him as part of my team.”
The GBI’s investigation stemmed from the May 20 arrest of Anthony Wade Smith, who deputies claim is a member of a local street gang. The 29-year-old felon is charged with possessing a firearm, violating his probation and participating in street gang activity along with a few misdemeanors, jail records show.
Dix told the Grip that Smith made a Facebook post that showed him with weapons and called out Pitts by name, adding that “racial terms” were aimed at the agent.
Pitts, who was not the deputy who arrested Smith, called Deputy Conner Dix — the sheriff’s son who made the arrest — and asked him to stop his patrol car along Experiment Street, the Grip reported. Pitts then drove to the location and got into an altercation with Smith, leading to a physical assault accusation.
The accusation, however, was not made by Smith. It was made by his mother.
“I came unglued. I think that is an understatement,” Darrell Dix told the Grip, describing his initial emotions after hearing from Smith’s mother. “I don’t know if I’ve ever been madder than that in my whole life, and I’ve been pretty mad.”
Once the sheriff confirmed that the patrol car had been pulled over, he said he immediately requested the GBI to investigate the incident. He did not launch an internal investigation, saying the allegations could be criminal, so the GBI should complete its investigation first, the Grip reported.
The sheriff said the GBI determined there was physical contact between Pitts and Smith. After that, Smith’s head hit a plastic partition within the patrol car.
Agents were not able to determine the force of the contact between the two men, Darrell Dix said. Pitts said he touched Smith on the shoulder in an effort to console him, while the suspect claimed that Pitts grabbed his shoulder and slammed him into the partition.
“It’s one of those things that there’s no denial his head went into the (vehicle’s) screen, but there’s no way of knowing if he jerked away and hit his head into the screen or was pushed into the screen,” the sheriff told the Grip. “I don’t think there’s any doubt that his head hit it.”
At one point during the incident, Pitts told Smith to keep his name out of his “effing mouth,” the sheriff told the Grip. He said that encounter never should have happened because Pitts should never have interfered with Smith’s transfer to jail.
“I think it was just an extremely poor decision and an extremely poor action that is a prime example of the confidence that we are trying to build, not just here, but across the country,” Darrell Dix told the Grip.
The GBI concluded its investigation Aug. 7, which is when Pitts resigned. The sheriff said he received his resignation before he could finish reading the report to determine if an internal investigation was warranted.
As a result, Pitts’ resignation was considered voluntary because he was not under an active investigation, avoiding a subsequent investigation by the Georgia Peace Officers Safety and Training Council (POST), records show. That allowed him to be hired Aug. 10 in Butts County.
“If he had stayed, there would have been disciplinary action taken against him that was pretty severe,” Darrell Dix told the Grip.
When asked about the quick hire, the Butts County sheriff said Pitts came “highly recommended for the job.” Long also cited that Pitts had no prior disciplinary history during his 16-year career, which POST records confirm.
Related to the incident, Conner Dix was suspended without pay for three days since he turned off his body camera. He told the GBI he heard the altercation but did not see Pitts slam the suspect’s head into the partition.
Smith remains in the Spalding County jail without bond, records show.
— AJC data specialist Jennifer Peebles contributed to this article.
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