The Atlanta Constitution from Atlanta, Georgia • 80

The Atlanta Journal The Atlanta Constitution LOCAL NEWS Sunday, December 26, 1993 H7 fnjli: I'iilWljli QllftiilWjMl GOVERNMENT, CRIME AND COURTS Each week, who are being sought by the FBI and are thought to be in the metro area are identified in this space. Please Os rail depot back on imdi! Lawmakers say multimodal plan making headway call 679-9000 if you can help agents apprehend them. Mm Kultimodd at a glance The state DOT map of potential commuter rail corridors Includes 1 2 rail lines radiating out from Atlanta and stretching 500 miles across 40 North and Middle Georgia counties. Estimated annual ridershlp Is about 6 million and construction time frame is about 20 years. Ora Armenthla Prince, 34, also known as Ora Armenthia Lewis, is being sought in Dallas in the Oct.

16 murder of her 10-year-old son. Prince allegedly strangled her son, placed his body in a Halloween bag and hid it in a closet of their apartment. Prince then allegedly turned the heat off, apparently to keep the body fresh, and fled Dallas on a Greyhound bus for Atlanta. Derrick O'Neal Bostic, 25, is wanted in Hillsborough County, on a murder charge. Bostic allegedly shot and killed a 22-year-old man after a traffic altercation.

He is a native of Atlanta and is considered armed. Gerald Gustavo Rivera, 19, is being sought in Clayton County after skipping bond on a 1992 robbery by intimidation con Ora Armenthla Prince Derrick O'Neal Bottle Gerald Gustavo Rivera William Harold Parker viction. William Harold Parker, 49, is wanted by the U.S. Marshal's Service for parole violation after a kidnapping conviction. He is also wanted in Meriwether County, where he is a rape suspect.

Parker, who uses many aliases, was last known to live in Coweta County. ARRESTED Kenneth A. Hannor turned himself in to DeKalb officials last week after seeing his picture in The Atlanta Journal-Constitution's Dec. 12 "Most Wanted" column. Hannor makes the 18th fugitive apprehended as a result of the column.

Kathy Scruggs BTForsyth 91 ALA. The price tag Atlanta multimodal station 1 25 million 1 2 commuter rail lines $84 million each Once completed, the system would probably still rely heaviry on public subsidies, which average about naif of total operating costs based on national averages. Other Ions-term costs would Include track improvements, labor and equipment CLAYTON COUNTY Then one foggy Christmas Eve. In a surreal episode of vandalism, someone turned over decorative reindeer at a home on Jerri Court in Riverdale during Christmas week. Besides upending Rudolph and company, the vandals also removed and smashed light bulbs that had decorated shrubbery sometime between 9 p.m.

Monday and 7 a.m. Tuesday. In a similar misdeed, someone stole light bulbs from bushes in front of another home in Jonesboro on Dec. 18. Soutok DtpartnMM oCSwKpomdon, Admt cantly from last year.

Gone are any references to the station's role in the 1996 Olympics and impact on Atlanta's struggling Downtown. Such arguments only solidified opposition to the plan among rural legislators, supporters now concede, and helped derail the program in the final days of the legislative session last year. "The rural area of Georgia has the greatest concern about it," said Rep. Jimmy W. Bene-field (D-Jonesboro), chairman of the House Transportation Committee.

"They look at it as a glorified bus stop. Frankly, they are the people that are going to have to be sold on it." Pushing economics Multimodal supporters appear to have gotten the message and now are pushing the economic benefit of the plan to outlying areas of the state. The Atlanta Chamber plans to circulate a study showing that communities with strong transportation links to Atlanta develop faster and tend to be more prosperous. REUBEN STERN Staff that federal funds would be made available for the Atlanta station, but the Legislature must commit to the program first. This Catch-22 has made many legislators afraid that the state could allocate funds and then not get the federal matching dollars.

Under the federal guidelines, Washington would fund 80 percent of the project and the state would pick up the remaining 20 percent. Shackelford has proposed spreading out the state's commitment over three years $10 million in years one and two and $5 million in year three. To ease concerns that the state could be left holding the bag if the federal government failed to match the funds, Shackelford said the state would not issue the bonds to cover the expense until federal officials formally commit to the station. "When all is said and done," Benefield said, "the Legislature is going to hear a lot from the business community. There will be a lot of pressure to go with this project." By Ken Foskett STAFF WRITER 1 On the closing days of the 1993 legislative session, one of the biggest budget proposals left on the cutting room floor was Gov.

Zell Miller's ambitious plan to build a regional train depot in Downtown Atlanta. Miller has publicly backed away from the so-called multimodal station, saying recently that he won't include it in the 1995 budget he plans to unveil Jan. 13. But some legislators believe the governor's public statements are designed to push the state's business community, which strongly backs the proposal, to the front lines, forcing them to turn up the heat on the state Legislature. "I think he's sending a message: The people who understand transportation need to sell this thing," said state Sen.

Steve Thompson (D-Powder Springs), chairman of the Senate appropriations subcommittee overseeing the Department of Transportation (DOT). The linchpin' The multimodal station still faces an uphill battle, ranking legislators say, but there are early signals that the governor's strategy is making headway. DOT Commissioner Wayne Shackelford is pushing the station in House and Senate committee meetings, calling it "the linchpin" of the state's transportation system. Shackelford is asking for $10 million in 1995 to begin construction. Most of the $125 million cost of the project would come from federal funds.

The Atlanta Chamber of Commerce and its statewide counterpart are also gearing up to lobby key legislators, especially those representing rural districts, according to business leaders. "The fact that the governor doesn't put it in his budget doesn't mean that it's doomed," said Gerald Bartels, president of the Atlanta Chamber. "It doesn't mean that in the heat of the battle that it couldn't be funded." Change in strategy Envisioned as a clearing station of buses, trains and public transportation, the multimodal station would serve as the hub for hundreds of miles of commercial rail lines, linking far-flung regions of the state in one giant rail network. Backers of the program have changed their strategy signifi- Exemptions By R. Robin McDonald STAFF WRITER Ricky Stafford and Frederick Waters are convicted felons.

Despite a Georgia law banning the sale of handguns to convicts, Stafford and Waters were able to buy guns in metro Atlanta this year, according to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms. Georgia requires no criminal background check of potential gun buyers. So over the course of several months, ATF agents say Stafford purchased more than 50 jfuns from metro gun dealers. Agents suspect he then resold them on Atlanta's streets. If the five-day waiting period now required by the Brady handgun control law had been in effect when Stafford and Waters went shopping for guns, ATF spokesman Bobby Browning said, those sales would never have taken place.

A routine criminal check would have revealed that, according to court records, Stafford, 31, had felony convictions in Boston and New York. Waters, 20, had felony convictions in De-Kalb and Fulton counties. Congressional staff members in Washington say that the handgun control legislation named after James Brady, a presidential press secretary whawas shot during the 1981 attempt on Ron- COBB COUNTY I Christmas spirit. Whether they became disoriented by the hustle and bustle of last-minute holiday shopping or unnerved by trying to beat the Christmas deadline, several shoppers became unusually forgetful last week. Marietta police say one man evidently forgot that he had put a personal TV into his shirt pocket before walking out of Radio Shack, while just down the street a woman was arrested for taking a Graco stroller from the Burlington outlet.

Busy elves. It may have been a case of Kris Kringle in reverse, but whoever entered a Marietta business last week took a sleighful of gifts. Police say there wasn't a trace of forced entry at the Ser- vice Master office on Powers Ferry Road. However, instead of leaving bounty this wicked elf made a microwave oven, laptop computer, chain saw, Ford pickup and 27-inch Triniton television disappear like magic. COWETA COUNTY Beware wise men bearing gifts.

Four men who authorities say used phony driveway-paving deals to scam the elderly out of thousands of dollars picked the wrong victim last week. When they offered to pave the driveway at Dock Jones's place in Grantville, a family member immediately called his son Newnan police Lt. Wayne Jones to And out if the deal was legitimate. The men fled before authorities arrived, but two were caught in Grantville and the other two were found fleeing up Interstate 85, said Investigator Tony Grant. He said the men, operating as Asphalt would pull up to an elderly resident's home, say they had leftover asphalt from another job and offer to pave the driveway for a bargain $200 to $250.

Afterward, they would tell the person the job cost more and demand as much as $3,000, Grant said. "The driveway would last for one or two trips and then it would break up," he said. Authorities have gotten reports of at least 10 suspected paving scams this year but it was unclear how many jobs these suspects might have pulled, Grant said. The suspects told police the Grantville stop was their first in the county. The men Ralph Anthony Hannah, 36, Stanley Dais, 29, and Bryan Michael Gorman, 36, all of North Augusta, S.C., and Randy Edward Scott, 30, of Ev-ansville, Ind.

face attempted theft charges. DEKALB COUNTY Acts prohibited in transit charged. An Atlanta man was arrested by MARTA police who accused him of selling a transfer ticket. "I was standing at the Decatur MARTA station when I observed Michael D. Turner approach a man at the token machine.

He spoke with the man and then sold him a MARTA transfer card," an officer reported. MARTA police arrested Turner, 39; of Atlanta, on charges of "committing certain acts prohibited in transit." A MARTA spokesman said arrests for selling or lending TransCards or half-fare cards are common. abound in Brady gun-control law R0onl Shackelford is also warning legislators of serious environmental consequences if the state fails to meet federal ozone emission standards by reducing automobile traffic over the next several years. In a worst-case scenario, Shackelford recently told members of the Senate appropriations committee, failure to comply could result in federal sanctions on the 13-county metro area and other parts of the state. "We are not building multimodal for the Olympics," said Shackelford.

"We are building the linchpin for balanced transportation in Georgia." Funding Catch-22 Several economic forces are also driving the multimodal concept. Funding for the facility is tied to federal funds released under the 1991 the Intermodal Surface Transportation Efficiency Act, making $155 billion available to states over a six-year period. U.S. Transportation Secretary Federico Pena has given state officials verbal assurances -v dealers, gun manufacturers and importers; people whose lives or families have been threatened; and potentially, anyone who already holds a state-issued handgun permit. The Brady law also applies only to handguns, not to the purchase of shotguns and rifles, which require no five-day waiting period, no background check and no permit to carry.

In the five counties surrounding Atlanta, 1,782 individuals hold federal firearms licenses and are automatically exempt from the Brady law. Since 1990, 9 i it 3 I -www 1 mm Fulton, Cobb, Clayton, DeKalb and Gwinnett counties have issued 46,672 permits to carry handguns. Bob Walker, director of federal legislation at Handgun Control Inc. in Washington, said he hopes those with carrying permits are not exempt from Brady. ATF has announced that waiting periods will be waived for those with handgun permits.

"It is not clear that a permit to carry is sufficient" to win an exemption to the five-day waiting period, Walker said. "It was never our intention to carry the legislation that far." The Brady law also ensures that the information from applications will never be used to track the purchase and sale of firearms. The law requires gun dealers to destroy all gun sale applications and background records within 20 days and cannot be used to establish any registry of guns or their owners. "That's because of the Na tional Rifle Association's para noia," Walker said. "The National Rifle Association wanted to ensure that records of these transactions wouldn't lead to some sort of national registration of handguns.

In their chain of reasoning, gun registration would automatically lead to gun confiscation. JOHN SPINK Staff The Brady law, depending on how it is applied, may neither act as a deterrent nor require a waiting period for thousands of people who choose to buy a handgun. GWINNETT COUNTY What's that little red light? Two men have been charged A in a camcorder sting set up by a Gwinnett woman with entering an auto and distribution of cocaine. William Jeffrey Maness, 20, of Marrietta and Gary Warner 26, of Acworth, turned themselves in to police last week after Warner's estranged wife caught the twb on videotape planting something in small plastic bags in her 1991 Dodge Spirit. The victim told police that the two suspects planted the cocaine because she and Warner are going through a divorce and are fighting over custody of their child, said police Sgt.

Steve Cline. She said cocaine had been planted in her car once before so she rigged up a camera and aimed it at her trunk. Both suspects were being held in the Gwinnett County Jail. Staff writfs Tim Fay. Scott Marshall, Pam Monastra, Macon Morehouse and Don Plummer contributed to this repori.

aid Reagan's life will deter handgun sales to convicted felons and to minors. And it will regulate the sale of handguns by unlicensed buyers. But its effectiveness, they said, will be limited. Depending on how the law is applied, the Brady law may neither act as a deterrent nor require a waiting period for thousands of people who choose to buy a handgun. Among those exempted from waiting five days before they are allowed to take a new handgun home are Alaska residents; gun.