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Hinesville Police blotter March 22
NewspaperCrimemap10

From Hinesville Police Department reports:

Fraud, extortion: A woman told police March 14 “someone had locked her laptop computer” after they tried to scam her.

The woman said she got several calls from someone who told her she’d won $4,500. The woman said she knew it was a scam and told the guy she didn’t want the money, but he kept calling and gave her an ID code number and password.

“Again (the woman) knowing that it was a scam told the person on the line that she did not want the money and the person became agitated and told her he would lock her computer.”

He did.

“Several minutes later her daughter who was using the laptop told her that she could not log back on even when entering the proper password,” the report said. “She shut the computer off and turned it back on but she could not get past the log-in page.”

The reporting officer called the number he got from the victim around 3 a.m. and spoke with an “Edmond,” who had a “Middle Eastern accent.”

“He told me that while speaking with ‘my wife,’ the laptop had a malfunction, during the course of the conversation he would state that the company was not a computer company but would add that if I paid $500 he would have the computer unlocked and be able to retrieve and have all my files,” the officer wrote.

“When I asked how I could pay the money to have it unlocked he said to obtain a gift card through Walmart and call him back at the same phone number and provide him the number on the card and within 30 minutes the computer would be unlocked.”

Lost or mislaid property: A woman reported March 14 that Horizon’s School was missing seven IPads from “former students who no longer attended school ….”

“She stated she has tried contacted them and received various reasons as to why the IPads were not returned, due to them all being lost.”

The names of the students and the IPads were recorded.

No license, speeding, more: An officer was patrolling Highway 84 on March 14 and “utilizing a laser to enforce the 45 mph speed limit.” That’s when he clocked a Ford Explorer going 64 mph and pulled the driver over.

“She provided me with a valid (learner’s permit). She was the only adult in the vehicle. I did hear children in the back and asked how many children were in the vehicle. She informed me that there were six children in the back. I observed four children in the third row. An 8-year old, 7-year-old, two 3-year-olds, none of them were in a car seat or in a seat belt. I also observed two children in the second row that were in car seats but were not restrained within the car seat.”

The officer told the driver to call a licensed driver to get the SUV and she also needed three more child restraints. By the time the officer finished writing up the tickets the driver’s mother had come with the car seats. The driver was arrested and then released with a court date.

The kids and the car were released to the driver’s mother.

Found property: An officer was called to a Highway 84 McDonalds where he spoke with a man who said he went into the “bathroom and observed what appeared to be an ankle monitor on the counter next to the sink.”

The officer verified it was an ankle monitor, and contacted a Department of Juvenile Justice employee who confirmed it belonged to DJJ and gave police the name of the person who was supposed to be wearing it.

He hadn’t charged it up, “therefore they were not notified when he removed it,” the report said.

Theft: An officer went to an Elm Street address March 14 for a report of a dog napping. The victim said a man took a 3-month old pit bull puppy that belonged to her son after she wouldn’t sell it to him.

The victim said when she left to go to the store a friend called to tell her the man had gone into her back yard and taken the dog, then drove off with a woman. The victim and her friend followed the car to Walmart, where they cornered the man “by the dog tag machine” and he told them he’d return the dog “and they need to follow him to his residence,” the report said. “While they were following his vehicle he was able to lose her.”

They did get a tag number, however, and it came back to a Fort Stewart address. The woman also said she sold a puppy to the man’s nephew. She was given a case number.

Battery: Police were called to the Waffle King around 4:18 a.m. March 11 due to a fight. When the reporting officer arrived, he was told the suspect, a woman, had just driven away. They said the suspect, “came in to the restaurant and demanded a refund for her food and when she was told that she could not be refunded her money due to her omelet being half eaten, (the woman) became violent.”

The employee who told the woman she couldn’t get her money back said the woman, whom they named, “knocked all the items off the counter. A ketchup bottle as knocked off the counter which hit the floor and broke causing ketchup to land (on the employee). A piece of glass from the ketchup bottle cut (the employee) on her right hand.”

A pregnant woman sitting nearby told the officer she saw the woman go nuts and “was hit in the stomach by a bottle as a result of (the suspect’s) actions.”

A third person, the employee’s girlfriend, “tried to stop (the suspect) from causing further injury to her girlfriend … by grabbing (the suspect) as she attempted to go over the counter to assault (the employee). (The third person) stated that (the suspect) bit her and repeatedly hit her in the face with her fist until an unknown male grabbed (the suspect) and forced her into a white (car). Once in the vehicle the two drove swiftly away.”

Police searched for the woman and went to the address given for the car’s tag number, but no one was there. The three victims were given a case number.

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