Police Blotter
Two armed robberies reported to police
Police were looking for three men Monday in connection with two Columbia County armed robberies.
A clerk at the Parkwest Inn at 452 Parkwest Drive near Grovetown told police that just after 3:30 a.m. Monday a man entered the hotel office from a side door and used a handgun to force the clerk to open the cash register and put $197 in a stocking cap, according to a sheriff's office incident report.
The clerk was forced to the ground, but heard the man leave out of the back door facing Interstate 20 a moment later, the report stated. The clerk called police, who cleared the building. Only then did the clerk realize the robber had also taken her purse.
The clerk described the robber as a black man wearing a gray hooded sweatshirt, black jeans, black gloves and a black ski mask over a red ski mask.
Police also were searching for two men who they say robbed the Martinez Dollar General store at 218 Bobby Jones Expressway just before 11:30 a.m. Monday, Columbia County sheriff's Capt. Steve Morris said.
The two men, described as black, with one in a green sweatshirt and the other in a tan jogging suit, robbed the clerk at gunpoint before leaving on foot toward a gray sedan, possibly a Dodge Stratus, parked behind Ryan's restaurant, Morris said.
The following accounts were taken from reports filed with the Columbia County Sheriff's Office:
Prank phone calls posted on Web site
A Martinez woman called police Thursday after discovering that harassing phone calls made to her house had been posted on an Internet Web site devoted to prank calls.
After two phone calls between 3:22 and 3:30 a.m. Nov. 30, the woman contacted police, telling them about a male who continually questioned her over the phone and became very rude. The caller, she said, asked for her husband's cell phone number, which she gave to him.
The woman said the man called her husband and was very rude to him as well.
The woman said she later received a phone call from the principal of Evans High School, who said the phone calls were listed on a prank calls Web site by some students of the school. The Web site was not named in the report.
Woman reports online scam
A Grovetown woman told police Nov. 30 that she was scammed out of nearly $2,000 by someone she met online.
The 24-year-old woman said she made contact with a man on the Internet and started chatting online with him. She told police the man asked her to be a payment officer for his company for the state of Georgia.
He told her he would deposit $1,000 into her checking account Nov. 21 and make a second $1,000 deposit Nov. 22 through the Internet.
The first deposit was made toward her account, so the woman withdrew $2,000 from her account Nov. 21 and sent the money to an address in Lagos, Nigeria, on Nov. 21, the report stated.
On Nov. 28, the woman said she received an overdraft statement stating that her account was $1,996.79 overdrawn.
Woman cites suspicious phone survey call
An Evans woman said that two recent phone surveys she received at home got a little too personal.
Columbia County sheriff's deputies responded to a reported suspicious situation Nov. 29 when the 69-year-old woman said she received two phone calls from individuals conducting phone surveys.
The caller asked very personal questions, the woman said, including her Christmas shopping habits and the number of televisions in her home. The woman hung up and has since changed her phone number.
Martinez Fire Department Activity Report for the week of Nov. 27-Dec. 3:
Structure fires, three; woods fire, one; grass fire, one; vehicle fires, two; controlled burn, one; fire alarms, six; natural gas leak, one; medical calls, 12; rescue calls, 13; and investigations, four.