Muscogee County News

Pine Mountain businessman Steve Earles has less than four weeks to figure out how to cut into Kip Smith's large advantage in the race for the vacant Georgia House 129 seat.

Derrick Lamar Johnson told Columbus police he had a loaded .357 Magnum cocked in his lap in the back seat of a 1995 Ford Taurus Tuesday night when he dropped the gun and it went off, fatally shooting the driver in the back.

Columbus fire officials say that one man is dead and another person is in the hospital being treated for smoke inhalation as a result of a house fire Wednesday night on Estes Drive.

A LaGrange, Ga., police sergeant was arrested in downtown Columbus on Halloween and charged with DUI, police records show.

A new federal report shows that more than 16,000 Georgia education jobs were saved or created through stimulus funding.

One in a series Four candidates, all Republicans, are running in a special election Tuesday to succeed Vance Smith Jr.

Three men convicted on multiple charges of armed robbery and aggravated assault were sentenced Thursday to more than a decade in prison.

Carlos Rodriguez, accused of fatally stabbing a soldier in November 2008, was indicted on murder charges Tuesday by a Muscogee County grand jury.

Jurors were moments away from entering the courtroom on Monday and hearing opening statements in the murder trial of Albert and Ashley Debelbot - the husband and wife accused of causing the death of their 3-day-old child.

Michael Dale Smith, accused of shooting a man in the torso Sunday morning, was arrested early Monday, jail records state.

Hardaway High School has a new student, Sarah. She's got brown eyes, curly hair and four legs.

The Columbus Bank and Trust Co. branch on U.S. Highway 80 in Ladonia, Ala., was robbed Tuesday afternoon, setting off a multi-jurisdictional law enforcement pursuit that ended at the Booker T. Washington apartments in Columbus, said Phenix City Police Capt.

A man arrested in connection with a Ladonia, Ala., bank robbery Tuesday has been linked to 10 other armed robberies in Columbus over the past month.

Investigators with the Columbus Police Department's vice squad raided a methamphetamine lab Sunday that was operating out of a residence on Beallwood Avenue.

The new school administration building on Macon Road has a name. The Muscogee County School Board voted 8-1 to name the $21.7 million building the Muscogee County Public Education Center.

Pick of the day People drive while texting, eating and talking on cell phones. My uncle worked crossword puzzles while driving he would have been 38 on Friday.

The Muscogee County School Board will be discussing several construction and repair projects in the district during their meeting on Monday.

Three boys sit around a kid-sized table in a classroom at St. Luke United Methodist Church.

Two deaths on Crystal Court early Tuesday are being investigated as homicides, Columbus police said.

Though the official vote won't come until the Muscogee County School Board meets again on Oct.