ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Monday, September 30, 1996 TAG: 9609300080
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-5 EDITION: METRO
Murder suspect surrenders
NEWPORT NEWS - A 20-year-old Newport News man turned himself in to police Saturday, a day after North Carolina authorities began looking for him after they say he shot and killed a man over a $50 debt.
Kenneth Lee Pugh walked into police headquarters shortly after 4 p.m. and said he was wanted in North Carolina, said police spokesman Bobby Kipper.
Bill Wheeler, a detective with the Halifax County Sheriff's office, said Pugh will be charged with first-degree murder in the death of 18-year-old community college student Gary Harvey of Halifax County, about 12 miles from the Virginia state line near Interstate 95.
Wheeler said Pugh visited Harvey's home, about three miles from Roanoke Rapids, at about 11 p.m. Friday. Pugh apparently shot Harvey with a small-caliber weapon when Harvey refused to pay him back $50 owed on an unspecified debt, Wheeler said. While there were no witnesses to the shooting, Wheeler said witnesses saw Pugh enter Harvey's mobile home, run out after the gunshot, and jump into a car driven by Pugh's brother, Ricky Lamont Pugh of Halifax. The two apparently drove to Newport News.
Wheeler said investigators have not recovered the murder weapon, which Ricky Pugh said ``was thrown in water along the travel route to Newport News.''
Sheriff's deputies arrested Ricky Pugh at about 6 a.m. Saturday, when he returned to his Halifax County home. He is charged with being an accessory to the murder and is being held in jail, Wheeler said.
In Newport News, Kenneth Pugh was charged with being a fugitive from another state. Kipper said Pugh was being held in Newport News jail Saturday without bail and will likely be extradited to Halifax.
Kipper said Pugh did not confess to committing any crime.
-Knight-Ridder/Tribune
Judge quits midway through inquiry
NORFOLK - A Circuit Court judge who resigned while under investigation for misconduct says other judges drove him from office for not being a ``go-along, get-along'' jurist.
In an interview with The Virginian-Pilot, Luther C. Edmonds said he was rebuffed while trying to correct racial discrimination against black bail bondsmen.
Edmonds denied that he committed any misdeeds in office. He denied having a relationship with former bondswoman Sherry Battle, showing favoritism in handling her cases or leaking information from the court to Battle for her lawsuit against other judges. Edmonds admitted to a charge that he called a fellow judge a liar in a meeting of judges.
He resigned Sept. 10, midway through a misconduct hearing by the state's Judicial Inquiry and Review Commission.
The hearing was private and the judicial commission cannot discuss the case under state law. Hearing witnesses would not discuss their testimony and the eight other judges of Norfolk Circuit Court declined to respond to Edmonds' interview and written statements.
Edmonds said he resigned because he could not be an effective judge while his colleagues were aligned against him.
``I have graciously resigned from office because I hold the position of judge as a very high, honored and respected calling. The legislators obviously picked the wrong man for the job - if they wanted `a go-along, get-along man,' '' he said in the article published Sunday.
Edmonds, 54, was a judge for seven years in General District Court and the past year in Circuit Court.
The turmoil started in March, Edmonds said, when bail bondsman Alexander Woodis complained about being suspended.
Edmonds reviewed all bail bondsmen files and wrote a memo to his colleagues reporting that bondsmen kept poor records and had inadequate collateral. He also concluded that rules were not uniformly enforced because four black bondsmen had been suspended while many other bondsmen, some white, some black, who were in violation were not suspended.
- Associated Press
2 on library board push restrictions
MANASSAS, Va. - Two members of the Prince William County Library Board are pushing to limit young people's access to books they consider inappropriate.
That would be done by creating an ``adults-only'' section of the library or by removing the books from the collection altogether.
The board members, Stephanie Chartrand and Dennis Daugherty, who also is president of the county Christian Coalition, have failed so far, including an unsuccessful effort Thursday night to remove radio personality Howard Stern's ``Miss America'' from the collection.
Chartrand and Daugherty want a review of the library's guidelines for buying books, and they favor requiring borrowers younger than 18 to get a parent's permission to check out any book from an adults-only section.
A majority of board members, however, have opposed such restrictions, saying they could ultimately result in censorship and inhibition of free speech.
``Restricting access has never been an option for us before,'' said 14-year board Chairman Joyce Phillips. ``Usually someone asks to have a book taken out of the collection,'' she said, adding that she cannot recall that happening during her tenure.
Phillips questioned the notion of an adults-only section and how guidelines for it would be drawn.
``If you persisted in this you could end up with the whole adult fiction eventually put behind the desk,'' she said.
Last month, the board voted 7 to 2 to keep another controversial book, ``White Ninja'' by Eric Van Lustbader, in its collection. The book, a thriller with sexual torture scenes, upset several community members, who complained to the library or the county Board of Supervisors.
After the board voted to retain ``White Ninja,'' it voted 6 to 3 to put off for a year any deliberations of restricting access to the collections.
But that hasn't stopped the debate. Daugherty said he has raised the issue in some fashion at every meeting since his January appointment.
On Thursday, Daugherty and Chartrand urged their colleagues to keep Stern's book out of children's hands, taking time to read parts of the book that included graphic descriptions of sex acts.
``I'm sure everyone in the room is very uncomfortable now,'' he said after he finished the reading. There was silence, and the motion to remove the book failed.
The controversy echoes recent issues in neighboring counties. In the spring, the Loudoun County Library Board voted to delete language condemning censorship from a standard library ``bill of rights.''
- Associated Press
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