Georgia DeKalb County Decatur News

May 15, 2012 at 8:48 PM

ATLANTA -- A pedestrian was struck and killed by a police car Tuesday morning.

The man was hit by a marked DeKalb County Police car, driven by Officer Jason Copper, on Memorial Drive, according to DeKalb County Police spokesman Maj. B. C. Harris.

Investigators said the police...more cruiser was en route to a chase resulting from an unrelated shooting at a south DeKalb County drive-in.

RELATED | Fatal shooting at Starlight Drive-In

Michael and Annamaria Davis told 11Alive's Paul Crawley the victim was their son, 27-year-old Clinton Hightower, and that he was on his way to his sister's house to babysit her children so she could go to work.

Hightower's parents said police showed up at their house at around 5 a.m. to tell them their son was dead and that "he didn't suffer."

Harris said investigators do not know how the accident occurred and are trying to find witnesses and possible surveillance video from a gas station near the

MARTA budget squeezed by $130M revenue decline

May 15, 2012 at 7:36 AM

ATLANTA -- It's budget time, and MARTA is bracing for a huge decline in tax revenue. They expect $130 million less through 2016.

MARTA Spokesman Lyle Harris said the MARTA Board approved a "steady state" service plan for fiscal year 2013 that does not contemplate cuts in bus or rail...more but that utilizes approximately $33 million in reserves, to balance the budget. Also, employees will see no annual or merit wage increases for the fifth year in a row. They'll also have to contribute more for retirement and health insurance benefits. Capital projects are limited to safety, security, and regulatory requirements.

READ | 2013 BUDGET HIGHLIGHTS

The proposed budget includes no new fare hike, but the final step up, voted on back in 2010, will go into place. It means reduced fares will go from $.95 to $1.00. The mobility base rate from $3.80 to $4.00, and the mobility monthly $122.00 up to $128.00. That increase for mobility comes with something: a 9

Downtown, decatur, Sandy Springs

Emory gets $5 million for pediatrics department

May 15, 2012 at 3:46 AM

ATLANTA -- The Emory University School of Medicine has received a commitment for a $5 million gift for its pediatrics department.

The money from the Marcus Foundation, Inc., will be used to create the Marcus Society in Pediatrics. The society will be the "intellectual home" for 15...more Marcus Professors in Pediatrics -- six existing Marcus Professors and nine who are newly funded. The society will also host an annual visiting scholar.

The nine new Marcus Professors will specialize in rheumatology, general pediatrics/adolescent medicine, emergency medicine/faculty development, cystic fibrosis, neurology, immunology, cardiology, general academic pediatrics/hospital medicine and hospital epidemiology/infection control.

The six existing Marcus Professors specialize in pulmonology, infectious diseases, nephrology, gastroenterology, endocrinology and neonatology.

The foundation and the department of pediatrics have a longstanding philanthropic

Eddie Owen fired from Eddie's Attic

May 14, 2012 at 4:01 PM

DECATUR, Ga. -- Eddie has left the Attic. According to his personal Facebook page this morning, Eddie Owen, namesake of metro Atlanta's 20-year-old music venue Eddie's Attic, was fired last Friday night.

Owen, 56, sold the venue bearing his name in 2002, but he stayed on as manager...more and talent booker in the years since.

Under Owen's leadership, Eddie's Attic became one of the great places in the nation to premiere acoustic music, as well as the first place that many people got wind of artists like the Indigo Girls, Sugarland and John Mayer.

Late last year, Owen became manager of Red Clay Theatre in Duluth, where he books acts under the name "Eddie Owen Presents."

From his own account, Owen appeared to be very happy with his place at Eddie's Attic. In an interview in this month's Atlanta Magazine, Owen said, "I don't think I'll ever leave the Attic."

Facebook and Twitter fans of Owen's took to the social media platforms Monday as word

When does the school year end?

May 14, 2012 at 10:09 AM

DECATUR, Ga. -- The last day of school is right around the corner for DeKalb County students.
Public schools, as well as Decatur City Schools, will dismiss for the summer on Thursday, May 24.
The last days of school in other metro Atlanta districts are staggered throughout the second...more half of May. They include:
Wednesday, May 16
Clarke County
Thursday, May 17
Hall County
Friday, May 18
Bartow County
Clayton County
Fulton County
Tuesday, May 22
Atlanta Public Schools
Barrow County
Wednesday, May 23
Carroll County
Gwinnett County
Newton County
Thursday, May 24
Cobb County
Rockdale County
Friday, May 25
Buford City Schools
Cherokee County
Coweta County
Douglas County
Fayette County
Floyd County
Forsyth County
Henry County
Marietta City Schools
Paulding County
Thursday, May 31
Griffin-Spalding County Schools

Brookhaven, decatur, doraville, Chamblee, Tucker, Dunwoody, Stone Mountain, emory

Serial bank robbery suspect arrested

May 14, 2012 at 9:59 AM

DEKALB COUNTY, Ga. -- DeKalb County Police have arrested a Stone Mountain man in connection with numerous bank robberies throughout the county.

Benjamin Rivers, 33, was taken into custody over the weekend after Crime Stoppers received several tips related to the...more robberies.

Witness statements led police to determine that each of the robberies occurred in similar ways -- a black man talking on a cell phone approached the teller and presented a demand note. After receiving money, he ran from the bank.
Rivers faces several charges related to the robberies.

decatur, Stone Mountain

Emory Men's Tennis Advances To National Quarterfinals

May 13, 2012 at 5:06 PM

ATLANTA -- The No. 2-ranked Emory men's tennis team has advanced to the quarterfinal round of the NCAA D-III Championships following a victory over No. 19 North Carolina Wesleyan in the regional final played Sunday afternoon at Emory University. The Eagles raised their overall record to...more 22-0 following a 5-1 decision over the Battling Bishops who closed out the campaign with a won-lost slate of 17-3.

Emory will take on No. 13-ranked Johns Hopkins (19-4) in the quarterfinals in on May 21. The Blue Jays earned a spot in the round of eight following a 5-2 decision over No. 12 Middlebury in a regional final. Emory's appearance in the quarters will mark the 21st time in 23 years that it has advanced that far in the national tourney. The Eagles have earned a spot in the national semifinals in nine of the past 10 seasons and captured team championships in 2003 and 2006.

Local company may hold key to HIV prevention vaccine

May 11, 2012 at 9:14 PM

ATLANTA, Ga. --- One of the keys to HIV/AIDS prevention, or possibly even a cure, may very well be sleeping in frozen quiescence in a small freezer in a hidden corner of a non-descript one-story building in Smyrna.
The GeoVax lab is not what you might expect of a biotech company that is...more literally leading the world in a race that could save millions of lives.

But that's exactly what it's doing.

Their vaccine, which is already in its second generation, has shown tremendous success in non-human trials.

"We're preventing infection to the extent that we're reducing infection by 90-percent which is very good," said Harriet Robinson, the Chief Scientific Officer and Co-founder of GeoVax. "I certainly hope that we also do that in humans; but we'll have to do the human trials to know."

And some of those human trials are already underway in Atlanta, as well as Los Angeles and the University of Alabama. Its focus is to see how the vaccine works in

Smyrna/Vinings, emory

Emory swimming heading to US Olympic trials

May 11, 2012 at 2:55 PM

ATLANTA, Ga -- Most student athletes would probably be more than happy to graduate from college with a nine individual championships and three team titles, others would be happy to have a job lined up after school.

Claire Pavlak has all of the above, and just added another line to...more her resume-US Olympic trial qualifier. She's the first swimmer from Division III Emory to ever qualify for the trials in Omaha this July.

There she'll be up against the fastest swimmers in the country.

"She's really charting new territory for us, it's exciting," said Emory swim coach Jon Howell.

The best part about her qualifying time? It wasn't even planned.

She thought her college career was over after her last nationals swim meet. She had finished 13 races in the previous four days. Then organizers at the meet decided to stage an impromptu time trial. Pavlak was tired, but she gave the 50 meter freestyle a try. With a time of 26.29 seconds, she made

Man killed in Decatur home

May 11, 2012 at 12:25 PM

DECATUR, Ga. (WXIA) - Police found the body of a man inside a Decatur home Friday morning.

The home is at 956 Sycamore Drive.

Police said they family had been called by the victim's employer after he did not show up to work on Thursday or Friday morning. The victim was...more described as being in his 50s.

They said there was trauma to the body, and that they were considering the death a homicide.

CDC: Half of young adults get sunburned

May 10, 2012 at 10:06 PM

ATLANTA -- U.S. health officials are reporting that half of adults under 30 say they have had a sunburn at least once in the past year.

Experts worry it's a sign young people aren't paying attention to the warnings about skin cancer.

The rate of sunburn is about the same as...more it was 10 years earlier, reversing progress reported just five years ago.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released the study Thursday, which was based on a 2010 survey of about 5,000 young U.S. adults.

The CDC also reported that about 6 percent of all adults said they had done indoor tanning in the previous year. But nearly one-third of young white women did.

SWAT on scene at Clarkston apartment complex

May 10, 2012 at 2:13 PM

DECATUR, Ga. -- DeKalb Police responded to a SWAT call at the Highland Village Apartment complex in Clarkston early Thursday afternoon.

According to officials, officers were pursuing a lead regarding suspects involved in the burglary of a Stone Mountain Police officer's home, earlier...more this week.

Officers successfully apprehended three of the people in the apartment; however, one male has refused to surrender. Police believe the man remaining in the apartment is connected to the burglary.

No other details were immediately available. This story is still developing.

Emory law student talks about being imprisoned in Egypt

May 9, 2012 at 4:06 AM

ATLANTA -- Conflict. Protest. Revolution. Whatever you call it, Egypt became home to it through early 2011.

It also became home to an Emory law student who for more than four months was held without charge in an Egyptian prison.

Ilan Grapel is a dual citizen of the U.S. and...more Israel; six years ago he served in the Israeli Defense Force. Last summer he headed to Egypt on an Emory internship, providing legal aid for Sudanese and Iraqi refugees. Grapel was spotted at a protest, though he said he was simply passing through as a tourist in a public square. Not long after, late on a Saturday night, Grapel said he was asleep in his hostel when an Egyptian SWAT team broke in.

"It was 40 guys in mustaches breaking down the door," Grapel recalled. "They took me downstairs to an unmarked van, put me in a blindfold and took me off. [They said], 'You're accused of espionage on behalf of a foreign entity, Israel, with the intent to do damage.'"

For two weeks,

42 percent of Americans could be obese by 2030

May 8, 2012 at 7:28 AM

WASHINGTON -- A new forecast on America's obesity crisis has health experts fearing a dramatic jump in health care costs if nothing is done to bring the epidemic under control.

The new projection, released Monday, warns that 42 percent of Americans may end up obese by 2030, and 11...more percent could be severely obese, adding billions of dollars to health care costs.

"If nothing is done (about obesity), it's going to hinder efforts for health care cost containment," says Justin Trogdon, a research economist with RTI International, a non-profit research organization in North Carolina's Research Triangle Park.

As of 2010, about 36 percent of adults were obese, which is roughly 30 pounds over a healthy weight, and 6 percent were severely obese, which is 100 or more pounds over a healthy weight.

"The obesity problem is likely to get much worse without a major public health intervention," says Eric Finkelstein, a health economist with Duke University

Columbia's Dennis reaches coaching milestone

May 7, 2012 at 2:20 PM

A graduate of old Briarcliff High School, Columbia High head baseball coach Steve Dennis registered his 300th victory as the head coach at Columbia in a 14-1 triumph over McNair April 26 at Columbia.

The victory came on the final day of the 2012 season and it was over a former...more Columbia player for Dennis in McNair head skipper Jonathan Dunton.

Dennis becomes the first baseball coach in DeKalb County history to reach 300 wins at the same school, posting the historic triumph in his 24th year at the helm of the Eagle program.

"As I started getting closer, that has been my ultimate goal," Dennis said of becoming the first to hit the 300 mark at the same location. "It's special, it really is. It was a good win. My phone has been lit up. I had to turn it off."

Freshman Trenton Nash collected two hits and junior Devonte Blow also added two hits and plated three RBI to lead the offensive charge, while junior Demetrius Jones tossed the full five innings