Free Republic

Police in Hinesville have made an arrest in a shooting early Sunday morning involving a homeowner and intruder. According to police, a Fort Stewart soldier, living at the Colonial Park Condos, 1100 Pineland Ave., was upstairs with his wife shortly after midnight when he heard someone enter his residence. He then went downstairs and confronted the intruder with a firearm. The two men exchanged gunfire. The homeowner was taken by medical helicopter to Memorial Health University Medical Center. A man later showed up at Liberty Regional Medical Center in Hinesville with a gunshot wound. He said he had been shot...

CHATSWORTH, GA (WRCB) - Hundreds of people in one north Georgia town are not allowed to drink their water. The water treatment plant in Ramhurst is temporarily shut down after someone broke in and changed the chemical settings. It's affecting about 400 Murray County residents. Local, state and federal officials are investigating who's to blame. Officials with Chatsworth Water Works say the source of the problems is at the Carter's Lake Water Treatment Plant in the Ramhurst area. Saturday workers noticed someone had changed some chemical settings. First, officials issued a "boil advisory" but the Environmental Protection Department bumped it...

James Richardson of Georgia Tipsheet has made the best use of Sanford’s win with this item, comparing his opponent to the Democrats’ likely standard-bearer in Georgia’s 2014 Senate race as someone who’s too far left of the electorate, lacking in political skills, and likely to lose: Left to cope without the party’s top possible recruit, conservative Democratic Rep. John Barrow, who announced he would seek reelection to the House over a Senate bid, Georgia Democrats are now poised to nominate their own Colbert Busch: Michelle Nunn, a prominent nonprofit strategist who boasts a gilded surname in these parts.

VIDALIA, Ga. — For years, labor unions and immigrant rights activists have accused large-scale farmers, like those harvesting sweet Vidalia onions here this month, of exploiting Mexican guest workers. Working for hours on end under a punishing sun, the pickers are said to be crowded into squalid camps, driven without a break and even cheated of wages. But as Congress weighs immigration legislation expected to expand the guest worker program, another group is increasingly crying foul — Americans, mostly black, who live near the farms and say they want the field work but can’t get it because it is going...

WOODSTOCK, Ga. — A Cobb County family says they’re having a hard time sleeping after someone left a burning cross and bloody deer meat on their front lawn. ... Sunday night around midnight, Louis and his brothers were at their home when they noticed something glowing outside. They were shocked by what they found outside. “We just see a flaming cross right there on the ground and we’re just shocked, like, what?” Louis said. Louis said he was primarily concerned about the safety of his brother’s four children and his pregnant girlfriend inside the home.

... When police arrived, they noticed a window in the garage was smashed, the front door of the house was off its hinges, and the mailbox was dented and bloody. Enix kept yelling "Come on!" from inside the home, according to the report. He leaned out of an upstairs window and yelled that police would either have to shoot or taze him before he would be arrested again. When he realized one of the officers was equipped with a less-lethal shotgun, Enix retreated back inside the house. When asked to negotiate, he told police that all he wanted to do...

(Reuters) - A small Georgia town on Monday passed a law requiring the head of each household to own a gun as a way to keep crime down.

The NRA apparently does not want its members to know what is in a gun related bill pending before the General Assembly. SB 101 was amended to do the following things. The NRA apparently does not want its members to know what is in a gun related bill pending before the General Assembly. SB 101 was amended to do the following things. Campus carry on public colleges, except dorms and athletic events; Campus carry on private colleges if the president adopts a policy permitting it; Government building carry where there is no security screening or courthouse (and permitting a way...

A woman arrested in December for allowing men to touch three young children is facing more charges along with her boyfriend, according to jail records and District Attorney Leigh Patterson. Dora Vanessa Gomez, 23, of 84 S. Orchid St., Ellijay, was booked into the Floyd County Jail on a bench warrant charging her with felony pandering a person under the age of 18, felony pimping a person under the age of 18, two felony counts of child molestation and two felony counts of sexual battery. Gomez was arrested on Dec. 7 on two counts of first-degree cruelty to children and...

A reform of the concealed carry law in Georgia passed the house on 7 March. The bill would reduce but not eliminate a number of gun free zones in the State. People with concealed carry permits would be allowed to exercise their Second Amendment rights in airports outside of the security zone, on college campuses (but not in dormitories or at sporting events), and in government buildings that do not have security. Churches would be allowed a greater exercise of First Amendment rights to freedom of religion and assembly, if arrangements are made in advance. Previously, guns were banned from...

Rep. Paul Broun (R-Ga.) boasted in a fundraising letter that he was the first member of Congress to call President Obama a “socialist who embraces Marxist-Leninist policies,” according to text acquired by the Atlanta Journal Constitution. “As a Member of the House of Representatives for the last few years, I have fought tooth-and-nail against President Obama's agenda at every turn,” the letter reads in part. “I was the first Member of Congress to call him a socialist who embraces Marxist-Leninist policies like government control of health care and redistribution of wealth.” Broun, who is running to fill the Georgia Senate...

Harper Polling has just cut loose its first poll in Georgia’s 2014 race for U.S. Senate, showing three Republican members of Congress in a tight bunch: In the Republican primary election for the open seat of Senator Saxby Chambliss, the race is wide open. The field is stacked with Members of Congress. In a state with 14 congressional districts, a Congressman’s statewide name identification is low and his support is confined early on to his district. However, if the field has 6 credible candidates, 35% could win the primary. Congressmen Paul Broun, Phil Gingrey, Tom Price, and Jack Kingston are...

An amendment to remove a reference to firearms from Carroll County’s disaster and emergency ordinance was passed by the Board of Commissioners Tuesday without discussion. The decision to change the ordinance was made to avoid conflicting with Second Amendment issues raised by a Georgia gun rights organization. The action eliminates the word “firearms” from a list of items whose sales could be suspended in case of a local disaster declared by the county commission chairman. The wording was questioned in a Jan. 18 letter, hand-delivered to commission Chairman Marty Smith, by James Camp of Temple, representing GeorgiaCarry.org. Read more: Douglas...

Sen. Barry Loudermilk, R-Cassville, introduced a bill Jan. 30 that would allow 18- to 21-year-olds to apply for a Georgia weapons carry license so long as they have had military training. The current law only allows those older than 21 to apply for a license. Senate Bill 74 would wave that requirement for any Georgia resident between the ages of 18 and 20 who has graduated basic military training with any branch of the U.S. military or the Coast Guard and allow them to acquire a carry license. For Loudermilk, the bill is another way to help veterans returning to...

Another gun turn in will be conducted at College Park, Georgia on February 9th, from 11 am to 5 pm. The turn in will be conducted at 3631 Main Street. $20,000 of public funds has been allocated for this political theater designed to delegitimize armed citizens, defraud ignorant gun owners, and increase the demand for new firearms by decreasing the supply of used ones. As is happening across the country, private citizens are likely to be on hand to pick up a bargain gun, while offering more than the city will for good quality guns. Others will be scouring...

A network of pimps lured dozens of women from Latin America with dreamland promises only to trade them cross-country like slaves, forcing them to perform up to 30 acts of prostitution a day, according to federal authorities. And it went on for five years before they were busted. Twelve people — eight men and four women — have been indicted in U.S. District Court in Savannah.

DEKALB COUNTY, GA (CBS ATLANTA) - A Decatur man fired his shotgun and hit a burglar who had broken into his home Thursday afternoon. It is the latest incident of homeowners protecting themselves from criminals. "I come into the gate. I come here and stop and he was coming out the window with a shotgun in his hand," said George McRae, who lives along Elgin Drive. The suspect found the shotgun that belonged to McRae inside the home after he had broken in. "I had my pistol in my pocket and I said, 'Put that gun down,'" McRae said. The...

Given the virulent media coverage surrounding the four 4 “pro-liberty” gun bills I recently introduced (HB26-29), I am compelled to share some of my thoughts. First off, I have received such an overwhelming response of support for these bills from individuals across the state and even nationally that I have had a difficult time keeping up. I want to thank each and every one of you for your encouragement and for your understanding of the importance of the 2nd Amendment and its role in protecting the people of this Nation. The issue of gun rights vs. gun control is a...

MARIETTA — An incoming lawmaker who has introduced several bills calling for loosening of concealed weapons laws in Georgia was told Saturday that his proposed legislation doesn’t go far enough. Carrying a .45-caliber pistol on his side, Guy Bennett said his 22-year-old son was in the Aurora, Colo., movie theater where a gunman opened fire during a July 20 showing of “The Dark Knight Rises,” killing 12 people and injuring 58 others. Bennett’s son’s girlfriend was among those hit in the mass shooting, but survived. Bennett, speaking to a panel discussion of eight current, outgoing and future Republican state representatives...

OCONEE COUNTY, Ga. - A north Georgia sheriff is taking a stand against a Buford gun store that refuses to sell certain types of rifles to the public. Dana Safety Supply has opted to only sell a semi-automatic, self-loading rifle to law enforcement and not to the general public. Oconee County Sheriff Scott Berry said that decision has led him to stop buying from the store. "If they chose not to sell to civilians, law-abiding civilians, then I can choose not to buy from them -- that's all I was trying to say," Berry said. DSS, which has stores in...