LaFayette attorney charged with perjury was also target of 2015 drug investigation

Larry Hill

Two years ago, attorney Larry Hill handed an inmate a lighter and a pack of Newports under the table.

But investigators observing the maneuver in surveillance footage at the Walker County Jail hoped for a bigger haul. For about a week, the Walker County Sheriff’s Office, the Georgia Bureau of Investigation and the local drug task force had tried to zero in on Hill, a LaFayette lawyer with an office next to the district attorney’s.

Some inmates told detectives Hill smuggled contraband into the jail, according to an investigative file obtained by the Times Free Press. They claimed his supplies ran from tobacco to marijuana to methamphetamine. And in June 2015, one inmate agreed to participate in a sting.

One night an inmate’s friend on the outside dropped off the cigarettes and lighter at Hill’s office, sliding them through the mail slot in the front door. Hill then brought them to the inmate, according to the file. The inmate told investigators something bigger would happen in 11 days: Allegedly, Hill agreed to sneak drugs inside.

The case fell apart soon after. Some other inmates suspected the source was working with police, and the source requested a transfer to a holding cell. Meanwhile, according to the file, an informant met with Ringgold attorney Jeremy Penland and told him what was going on.