Author: Dick Mangrum

From federal court in Athens, Georgia there’s word that the government’s case against a former Hart County probate judge could reach the jury room this afternoon. The prosecution went to trial against Bobby Joe Smith on Monday. The 77-year old former probate judge is charged with bribery and deprivation of rights.

The police in Seneca have made their first arrest in a series of auto break-ins and thefts that have plagued car owners since the Memorial Day weekend. The crimes have occurred on the south side of the railroad tracks. The police have announced the arrest of Kenneth Charles Goss of Seneca, accused in eight arrest warrants. And Chief John Covington […]

Fires have heavily damaged two homes in a remote part of northern Oconee County in the past two weeks, but one fire fighter says there are no indications one fire is connected to the other. The latest was last evening on Clearwater Cove where fire struck a three-story unoccupied house. On May 31, a nearby fire devastated a newly-built home […]

A case alleging reckless homicide on South Carolina 28 in the Bountyland Community last year is in position number one for trial during an Oconee General Sessions Court term June 24-28. It’s the case of South Carolina v. Thomas James Kirby. A Walhalla resident, Kirby was arrested by the highway patrol about three weeks after an accident that took the […]

Blue Ridge Electric Cooperative and the other Co-Ops in South Carolina are under a new governance law, and a Blue Ridge spokesman says the law is going to mean greater transparency for consumers. Governor McMaster’s signature signed the governance bill into law during a ceremony on May 17. The legislature decided to write new rules after abuses came to light […]

Walhalla’s annual Farmers Market will make its 2019 debut tomorrow morning–one week after rain washed out the original opening.  Consumers are invited to stop by the market between 8 and 11 tomorrow morning at the Walhalla Center for the Performing Arts on N. Broad Street.  South Carolina DHEC reminds everyone that eating five to seven servings of fruits and vegetables […]

Walhalla fire fighters, followed by Duke Energy crews, responded to yesterday afternoon’s scare on Tyre B. Mauldin Street.  At 3 o’clock, a tree limb on fire made contact with an electric power line.  The fire department and the power crew remained there until the situation was safe for the residents of that neighborhood.

A call to a rural convenience store on Wednesday turned into a wider investigation of shoplifting incidents, according to an announcement by the Oconee Sheriff’s Office. The Sheriff’s Office yesterday announced the arrest of Hunter Blasé Brauch of the Stamp Creek Road, Salem after an incident at the Country Junction Store and an altercation with a store clerk. Brauch was […]

A large ridge of high pressure that created the area’s hot and dry weather has been replaced by a trough of low pressure that ushered in clouds, rain and cooler weather.  That development, according to the South Carolina Drought Response Committee, is enough to completely remove the drought declaration completely for Oconee, Pickens and Anderson counties.  The incipient drought status […]

The funeral for Raymond Eugene Dodd, 73, of Seneca will be 11 o’clock Tuesday morning, June 18 at the Newry Church of God; the burial to follow in Oconee Memorial Park.  Dodd, along with Dr. Stan Rampey of Seneca, died Wednesday in a Florida plane crash.  Dodd was a self-employed mechanic and a veteran of the U-S Army in Vietnam.  […]