Georgia Criminal Defense Blog

A Carrolton dentist is facing a 12-count indictment, including three felonies, alleging that he assaulted patients when they were sedated. According to an article in The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, 55-year-old Dr. Gordon Trent Austin faces nine counts of simple battery, two counts of aggravated assault and one count of first-degree child cruelty. The incidents reportedly involved eight patients.

One of those patients filed a lawsuit against the dentist March 26 alleging he was physically abusive to her during a visit in May 2006. The suit accuses Austin of extracting the patient’s teeth without sufficient anesthesia and then hitting her in the face with a heavy metal object when she tried to resist. Austin’s defense attorney is saying that the woman’s account of events in the civil lawsuit, are “erroneous.”

The violent crime defense attorney says his client has a spotless track record of serving as a doctor in the community. Austin is of course innocent until proven guilty and that’s what many of us forget when it comes to criminal cases. Accusations that are horrible are just that – accusations. No one has testified to them under oath. Allegations are just statements made by people until they are proved in a court of law before a judge or a jury.

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In a cautionary tale about the very serious nature of criminal suits for clients and attorneys alike, a Superior Court judge has ordered a couple and their attorney to pay more than $1 million in legal fees and court costs from a dismissed case. According to an article in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, the lawsuit alleged sexual misconduct against Bishop Earl Paulk, one of Atlanta’s preeminent preachers in the 1980’s and 1990’s. Mona Brewer claimed in the suit that she had a 14-year coercive affair with Paulk, but the suit was dropped by the Brewers last July.

The judge entered the order Friday, January 22nd against Mona and Bobby Brewer and their attorney, for costs incurred by three different legal firms who defended Paulk in the Superior Court case.

Atlanta Sexual Misconduct charges are some of the most serious charges one can claim against another individual. The damage that these claims can have on an individual’s reputation can be devastating, regardless of whether the charges turn out to be true or not. A series of sexual misconduct allegations plagued Paulk’s work and as a result of this, he lost influence in the community, and eventually, his ministry.

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A recent op-ed in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution touches on the devastating effects entry into Georgia’s “draconian” sex offender database can have on lives and careers. The article, which follows a local man’s struggle to keep a valued employee – and a registered sex offender – on staff, exposes the many issues of HB 908, which seeks to reinstate the sex offender law that was tossed out in 2006 due to its unconstitutional limits on the lives and careers of sex offenders.

The article points out that the current bill does not distinguish between severe and low-risk offenders and fails to make sensible provisions for people who are barred from living where children congregate. If passed, the law could reinstate restrictions on where registered offenders live and work, a move that could actually increase public risk as some sex offenders fail to register with their local sheriff due to fear about the law’s impact on their lives.

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In a disturbing example of child molestation, a high ranking aide to Governor Deval Patrick’s administration was accused of sexually assaulting a boy in the steam room of a Florida resort, according to an Atlanta Journal Constitution report. Carl Stanley McGee, 38, the assistant secretary for policy and planning was arrested December 28th after the suspected assault and has since been placed on unpaid leave.

“Mr. McGee was placed on unpaid administrative leave effective January 7th pending the outcome of the matter,” a spokeswoman for Secretary of Housing and Economic Development Dan O’Connell, said in a statement.

McGee met the boy, who police said is between 12 and 16 years old in a bathroom at the resort a day before the incident occurred. The next day the two ran into each other in the resort’s steam room. According to the boy, McGee sat next to him, removed his towel, rubbed the boy’s back and shoulders and performed oral sex on him. The boy’s father contacted police after his son informed him of the incident.

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Police in Norcross say they are conducting an Internet child predator sting by using undercover officers posing as teenagers. So far, one person, 47-year-old Kenneth Edward Noland of Atlanta, has been arrested for sending a nude photo of himself to an officer posing as a teen and even setting up a meeting, according to an article in The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Noland reportedly didn’t show up to the scheduled meeting, but was arrested on suspicion of furnishing obscene material to a minor, which is a misdemeanor, the newspaper reported.

What does this mean for Noland? If convicted, he will be mandated to register as a Georgia sex offender and cannot have unsupervised contact with minors. He is currently out on a $2,850 bond. Police say although he did not come to the meeting, sending out obscene material to an underage person is a crime. Investigators also told the newspaper that most of the men they communicated with broke off contact when they found out the posing officer’s made-up age.

According to Georgia law, electronically furnishing obscene material to minors is illegal if one knows or has good reason to know the character of the material furnished. This includes material such as pictures or photograph of a person or a portion of the human body, which is suggestive of sexual conduct or depicts sexual conduct, nudity or abuse. Written matter could also fall under this category.

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Was it a “deadly sin”, a crime or just one night of stupidity? That’s the issue courts in Georgia are grappling with in the case of Genarlow Wilson, who is serving a 10-year prison sentence in this state for having consensual oral sex with a girl when they were both teens and minors.

According to an Associated Press news report a New York-based investment manager and 10 other business leaders have offered to post a $1 million bond to free Wilson, but prosecutors say the incarcerated man is not eligible for that bond.

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Authorities in New Orleans last week arrested an Augusta man on suspicion of impregnating his girlfriend’s teenage daughter, according to an article in the Augusta Chronicle. Police arrested 38-year-old James Wiley and extradited him to Georgia after charging him with one count of child molestation.

Investigators say the girl was only 14 years old when the alleged incident occurred. The state of Georgia’s permissible age for sexual consent is 16. Authorities got wind of it in January 2005 when someone working at the Augusta Pregnancy Care Center called the police. A nurse found out from a conversation with the girl that her mother’s boyfriend was responsible for the pregnancy, the news report said. Officials also performed DNA tests on the girl and her child after its birth in June 2005 and determined that Wiley is the father.

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