Gwinnett County’s district attorney will ask a grand jury to consider a case against Clayton County Sheriff Victor Hill, accused of reckless conduct in the shooting of a friend.
Hill was arrested and charged on May 6, three days after his friend Gwenevere McCord was shot and critically wounded inside a Lawrenceville-area model home. The charge is a misdemeanor, but Gwinnett County District Attorney Danny Porter said in a statement released Thursday that he thinks taking the case to the grand jury was “the best course of action.”
Georgia statutes say a law enforcement officer charged with a crime during the performance of their official duties is entitled to have that case presented to a grand jury, Porter said. Whether or not Hill — who reportedly drove a county-owned vehicle to the model home — should be considered on-duty during the shooting is still being debated, but Porter said he wants to play it safe.
“There’s enough of a question here that [Gwinnett County Solicitor-General Rosanna Szabo] and I decided that the safest way to go was to present the case to the grand jury, so later on down the road [Hill] can’t come back and say it should’ve been,” Porter told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
McCord, a 43-year-old real estate agent from Jonesboro, and Hill were alone inside the model home on Britt Trail Drive when she was shot in the stomach. Hill called 911 to report the shooting, saying he and McCord were practicing “police tactics” when she was shot, police said.
McCord has corroborated Hill’s statements to investigator. Her father called the shooting a “freak accident.”
Porter said the case will be presented in September, and that the grand jury will be given options for charging Hill — meaning the reckless conduct charge currently filed against the sheriff could, at least theoretically, be upgraded to a felony, such as aggravated assault.
Efforts to reach Hill, his spokeswoman Shegale Thurmond and the McCord family Thursday were unsuccessful.
Hill’s attorney in the case, Mike Puglise, said late Thursday afternoon that he hadn’t been made aware of Porter’s decision and declined to comment, saying it would be “improper” to do so.
Porter’s decision drew mixed reaction from community leaders and one person who was once part of Hill’s inner circle.
Rosa Barbee, a community activist in Clayton, called the district attorney’s decision to go to the grand jury “a waste of time and taxpayer money.”
Barbee, founder and president of a citizens watchdog group called Georgia Active Support Group, said the taking the case to the grand jury is “politically motivated. They’re going after him again.”
But Jonathan Newton, who was Hill’s spokesperson during his first term, praised Porter’s decision.
“I’m pleased with the decision that the district attorney of Gwinnett County has chosen so there can be an airing of the facts and the citizens of Gwinnett can chose whether that conduct is acceptable in their county,” said Newton, who is now president of the National Association Against Police Brutality in Washington, D.C.
“When a police officer operates a police vehicle in a reckless manner without due regard for safety of the public and someone gets hurt, they’re subject to criminal liability and that’s often a felony,” said Newton who is also in law school. “There should be no distinction between a gun and a vehicle being operated recklessly. The conduct of Victor Hill regarding this shooting and his refusal to cooperate with the subsequent investigation are indicative of an individual who shows little regard for public safety and the law in which he is sworn to uphold.”
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