No one injured in shooting barrage on Chambers Street
Rome police are investigating an apparent drive-by shooting on Chambers Street that riddled a house and car with bullets but injured no one.
According to police records: Reports started coming in to the 911 Center shortly after 10 p.m. Sunday regarding multiple shots fired in the North Rome area of Calhoun and Kingston avenues. While police were searching for the location, a Chambers Street resident called to describe what happened at her home.
The woman said she and her grandson were in the house when several shots started hitting the structure. They got down, and stayed down, until the barrage stopped.
Police found bullet holes in the front of the house, the inside walls and a bullet on the floor of a front bedroom. All the windows were shot out of the grandson’s car, which was parked on the street. Officers collected a mixture of .22-caliber and .40-caliber shell casings at the scene.
A resident on Gordon Avenue, behind the Chambers Street house, discovered later that a bullet had struck a window of her car, continued through the vehicle and hit her house.
Police warn of latest phone scams
Several residents reported being scammed out of money electronically and police are offering little hope of tracking down the criminals.
According to Rome and Floyd County police records:
One woman reported getting a call from a man claiming to be with the Internal Revenue Service who said she had to pay $1,980 in back taxes or go to jail.
She followed his instructions to buy Google Pay cards and give him the account number. A police officer was with her when the man called back and told her she had to pay another $4,000. He spoke with the scammer, trying to get him to come to the home but, when questioned, he identified himself as a police officer and the man hung up.
“I told (the woman) it is likely she would not get her money back and explained that the IRS doesn’t call people and ask for money in exchange for not going to jail,” the report states. Neither do sheriff’s deputies. A man reported he was called by someone claiming to be a deputy. The scammer said he needed to pay a $1,000 fine for missing jury duty and the man followed instructions to buy Google Pay cards for the payoff. He became suspicious before providing the account number, however, and went to the police station instead.
In a third recent incident, the scammer pretended to be a representative from an energy drink company offering to pay a local man $400 to use his car as an advertising billboard.
The Floyd County man received a check for $1,970.09 in the mail and followed instructions to cash it and send a money order for the difference to an address in Florida. He found out later that the check he cashed was bogus, and his bank account had also been cleaned out by the scammer. Diane Wagner, staff writer
Woman charged with felony shoplifting
A Rome woman is charged with felony shoplifting at a local pawn shop. According to jail reports: Kristan Michelle Redden, 27, of 2039 Black’s Bluff Road, is accused of leaving the shop at Floyd County Pawn Inc., 1330 Martha Berry Blvd., without paying for undisclosed merchandise. No value was listed.
Report: Man who hit woman had stolen firearm
Police responding to a domestic incident arrested a Rome man on charges including possession of a stolen firearm early Tuesday morning. According to jail reports: Jason Kirk Johnson, 34, of 301 Watters St., is accused of striking a woman in the face causing swelling to an eye and lip. When police took Johnson into custody at a location on Link Street, he had a quantity of marijuana, a digital scale with marijuana residue and a stolen firearm.
Johnson was charged with felony theft by receiving stolen property, and misdemeanors for possession of marijuana, possession of drug-related objects, a probation violation and battery. Doug Walker, associate editor