Deputy Accused Of Taking Money From Suspect
POSTED: 10:39 am EDT July 18, 2007
JEFFERSON, Ga. -- The Jackson County Sheriff's Department has fired a deputy accused of stealing money from a drunken-driving suspect he arrested.
Stanley Shaundale Scoggins, 28, was charged Friday with theft by receiving stolen property and violating his oath of office, officials said. The charges followed an internal affairs investigation that included a polygraph test.
Scoggins was fired the same day, officials said. He had been a deputy for 15 months.
And investigators may file additional charges because they are taking a look at a previous complaint that Scoggins stole money from another drunk driver in last August -- four months after he was hired as a Jackson County deputy, officials said.
Sheriff's Maj. David Cochran said the earlier case remained open and is being revisited because of last week's arrest.
Scoggins arrested a Maysville man on June 28 after the man allegedly left the scene of a drunken-driving crash on Interstate 85. But as the man was being booking into the jail, he complained that he was missing $160 dollars. Scoggins denied knowing anything about the money, Cochran said.
The deputy changed his story after he failed a polygraph test Thursday but denied stealing the money.
The deputy said he searched the back of his patrol car and found the money, but only after being questioned by supervisors and internal affairs investigators, Cochran said. Scoggins said he thought reporting the found money then would make him look guilty, Cochran said, so the deputy said he put the money in a bag and threw it away.
Scoggins is free on $7,000 bond.
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