Marine
12-31-2002, 10:32pm
If not for an alert state corrections employee, two convicts might have made it home for the holidays on phony early-release documents.
DeKalb County officials say Alonzo Morefield and Stewart Pullin, or someone acting on their behalf, nearly pulled it off. The two state prisoners are now in solitary confinement at Smith State Prison in Glennville while authorities try to find the source of the fake court orders that might have sprung them from the southeast Georgia facility.
"Their timing was either lucky or they knew the system," said DeKalb County District Attorney J. Tom Morgan. "They nearly got away with it."
Morefield, 34, an Ohio prison escapee, was convicted of kidnapping, assault, attempted escape and other charges and sentenced to 19 years in prison with no possibility of parole. Pullin, 41, of Stockbridge, behind bars for manslaughter, assault and burglary, has been serving a sentence that doesn't end until 2059. He would be eligible for parole in 2053. Both men were convicted in 2001.
It wasn't immediately known whether the two inmates knew each other.
Officials confirmed that the supposed court orders, one of which arrived on Dec. 24 and the other three days later, were forgeries.
When Susan Roberson, a Department of Corrections court liaison officer in Atlanta, read the first letter, she became suspicious. She called the DeKalb district attorney's office to verify its authenticity but no one was there on Christmas Eve to take her call.
"These orders read funny to her. They didn't exactly make sense," said Corrections Department spokeswoman Peggy Chapman, who described Roberson as a "stickler for detail."
On Morefield's "release," for example, the name of Assistant District Attorney John Petrey was misspelled as "Petry." The bogus court order also stated that Morefield was being given an early release as part of a plea agreement for helping prosecutors convict former DeKalb Sheriff Sidney Dorsey for ordering the murder in December 2000 of his elected successor, Derwin Brown.
Morefield had told prosecutors and reporters, among other things, that Dorsey had tried to hire him to kill Brown. But prosecutors didn't believe Morefield.
When Roberson contacted Morgan on Dec. 27 about the two release letters, Morefield's name jumped out at the district attorney as being a phony.
"She was on top of things," Morgan said of the corrections officer.- Staff Writer Don Plummer contributed to this article.
http://www.accessatlanta.com/ajc/metro/dekalb/1202/31forgery.html
DeKalb County officials say Alonzo Morefield and Stewart Pullin, or someone acting on their behalf, nearly pulled it off. The two state prisoners are now in solitary confinement at Smith State Prison in Glennville while authorities try to find the source of the fake court orders that might have sprung them from the southeast Georgia facility.
"Their timing was either lucky or they knew the system," said DeKalb County District Attorney J. Tom Morgan. "They nearly got away with it."
Morefield, 34, an Ohio prison escapee, was convicted of kidnapping, assault, attempted escape and other charges and sentenced to 19 years in prison with no possibility of parole. Pullin, 41, of Stockbridge, behind bars for manslaughter, assault and burglary, has been serving a sentence that doesn't end until 2059. He would be eligible for parole in 2053. Both men were convicted in 2001.
It wasn't immediately known whether the two inmates knew each other.
Officials confirmed that the supposed court orders, one of which arrived on Dec. 24 and the other three days later, were forgeries.
When Susan Roberson, a Department of Corrections court liaison officer in Atlanta, read the first letter, she became suspicious. She called the DeKalb district attorney's office to verify its authenticity but no one was there on Christmas Eve to take her call.
"These orders read funny to her. They didn't exactly make sense," said Corrections Department spokeswoman Peggy Chapman, who described Roberson as a "stickler for detail."
On Morefield's "release," for example, the name of Assistant District Attorney John Petrey was misspelled as "Petry." The bogus court order also stated that Morefield was being given an early release as part of a plea agreement for helping prosecutors convict former DeKalb Sheriff Sidney Dorsey for ordering the murder in December 2000 of his elected successor, Derwin Brown.
Morefield had told prosecutors and reporters, among other things, that Dorsey had tried to hire him to kill Brown. But prosecutors didn't believe Morefield.
When Roberson contacted Morgan on Dec. 27 about the two release letters, Morefield's name jumped out at the district attorney as being a phony.
"She was on top of things," Morgan said of the corrections officer.- Staff Writer Don Plummer contributed to this article.
http://www.accessatlanta.com/ajc/metro/dekalb/1202/31forgery.html