Courts and Crime

    Arthur Franklin Monday dropped his jumpsuit and maintained his innocence during his sentencing hearing Friday in which Judge James Updike sentenced him to 12 years in prison on a forcible sodomy conviction.

    “I never touched those girls or forced myself on them in any way,” Monday told Judge Updike before sentencing was handed down. “I maintain my innocence.”

    An angry argument, last May, resulted in Gary Hamilton’s death and, after a two-day trial last week, 53-year-old Jeffery Thomas Caldwell becoming a convicted felon.
    The altercation came about after Hamilton nearly ran over one of Caldwell’s dogs and Caldwell went to Hamilton’s home to confront him over the incident. It ended when Caldwell, who has a concealed weapon permit, shot Hamilton in the back of the head with a .357 magnum revolver loaded with jacketed hollow points.

    On Jan. 20, Tony Ware appeared in Circuit Court for a show cause hearing and asked Judge James Updike for a continuance in order to hire an attorney. He was granted a continuance until March 1.
    Tuesday afternoon, Ware was back in court, still without an attorney. He said a local lawyer told Ware that he should take the money he was going to pay him and put it toward the restitution he must pay.

    A former employee of Cash Advance in Bedford will have to pay back $12,000 in restitution to the business, following her conviction on three counts of identify theft Friday in Bedford County Circuit Court.

    Helen Meador Moody was arrested in December 2014 on the charges and entered guilty pleas last October. On Friday she was sentenced to two years in prison with all of that time suspended. She will serve two years of supervised probation and have to make the restitution payments at no less than $100 per month beginning in April.