By Rhonda Cook
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
FULTON COUNTY, Ga. — Two lieutenants in the Fulton County Sheriff’s Office pleaded innocent Thursday to federal charges they beat up a prisoner, the latest cases in an ongoing federal investigation of inmate abuse at the Fulton County Jail.
Lt. Earl Glenn and Lt. Robert Hill both pleaded innocent and were released later on $10,000 signature bonds. They are the second and third jail officers charged with abusing inmates and lying to FBI agents investigating the allegations.
U.S. Attorney David Nahmias said more jail deputies would be arrested on charges of abusing inmates or obstructing the FBI.
Fulton County Sheriff Ted Jackson, who was not in office when the abuses allegedly occurred, said he would cooperate with the federal investigation.
Hill is charged with using excessive force, making a false report about the incident, lying to FBI agents and obstructing the federal probe. Glenn, charged with the same four felonies, also is accused of asking other jail deputies “to stick with the story” when federal agents questioned them, assistant U.S. Attorney Brent Alan Gray said during a Thursday bond hearing.
Hill allegedly told co-workers at an Aug. 8, 2008, roll call to “send them to Grady” Memorial Hospital if an inmate touched them.
Later that day, Glenn, 47, and Hill, 46, attacked inmate Christopher Trammell, according to jail records.
Glenn was the first to assault Trammell and that Hill beat Trammell in the hospital medical unit where the prisoner was waiting in handcuffs and leg chains to be taken to the hospital, records show.
Glenn, of McDonough, and Hill, of Decatur, also allegedly continued to lie to FBI agents about Trammell even after Nahmias announced the arrest of another jailer on charges of beating up inmates and lying about the incidents.
“Our message today ... should be a wakeup call that we are not going to tolerate abuses of inmates and particularly obstruction [of a federal investigation],” Nahmias said.
On March 20, another deputy became the first of the three to be charged with abusing inmates. Deputy Curtis Jerome Brown Jr., 41, of Lithonia was charged with beating a mentally ill inmate, who later died, and then lying to federal agents about it.
Copyright 2009 The Atlanta Journal-Constitution