Ken HillmanRINGGOLD, Ga. - A local defense attorney says prosecutors are stalling in an attempt to keep a series of sex sting cases from falling apart.
After an assistant district attorney asked a judge last week to delay a trial that is supposed to begin July 20, Lookout Mountain Judicial Circuit Public Defender David Dunn filed a motion Monday accusing the state of lying about why it wants to push back the cases.
Dunn represents Michael Anthony Bales and Robert Niles Swartout Jr., two men arrested in 2012 as part of the Northwest Georgia Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force. As part of a "To Catch a Predator"-style operation run by the FBI, Bales and Swartout are accused of traveling to a designated place to have sex with children. Instead, they were met by law officers and arrested.
But their cases, as well as those of six other defendants, have been pending for three years because the head of the task force, FBI Special Agent Ken Hillman, is suspended and under criminal investigation.
Local businessman Emerson Russell said his estranged wife had an affair with Hillman and that the FBI agent allowed her to chat undercover with suspects despite having no police training. Hillman did not mention Russell in his arrest reports and testimony to grand juries - potential crimes.
Last month, tired of waiting, Dunn asked for a trial as soon as possible. Superior Court Judge Grant Brantley obliged, setting Bales' and Swartout's cases for July 20.
On June 4, however, Assistant District Attorney Alan Norton asked Brantley for a postponement because Rossville Police Detective Dave Scroggins, who helped arrest and interview the suspects, will be on a vacation booked in October.
But Dunn said Norton is making excuses. The real issue, Dunn wrote in a court motion this week, is that Norton won't be able to call Hillman to the stand.
Dunn asked Brantley to deny the requested delay, but Brantley had not ruled as of Thursday afternoon.
In previous months, Brantley and a federal judge ordered attorneys not to subpoena Hillman while the FBI investigates him. "In blatant disregard" for those orders, Dunn wrote, District Attorney Herbert "Buzz" Franklin tried to get a subpoena anyway.
Franklin and the FBI have declined to comment about whether Franklin actually issued a subpoena.
Assuming Hillman does not come to court, Dunn wrote, the prosecutors won't be able to introduce the key evidence against the defendants.
"Without his appearance and testimony," Dunn wrote, "the State is unable to prove the charges against the Defendant. The DA knows that, if held to the July 20 trial date, said case would be dismissed due to the lack of evidence."
Hillman's lawyer already has said that if Hillman takes the stand he will refuse to testify, pleading the Fifth Amendment to all questions.
But assuming the prosecution's reason isn't "disingenuous," Dunn said, the excuse about Scroggins' vacation is not a good enough reason to delay trials.
"Officers who make cases are expected to appear in court," Dunn wrote, "which sometimes involves personal inconvenience. Expecting everyone else involved - from the (judge) to the jurors summoned - to rearrange their schedules to accommodate a vacation date is unreasonable and irrational."
Contact staff writer Tyler Jett at tjett@times freepress.com at 423-757-6476.