A DeKalb County career criminal that police call a “one man crime wave” has been effectively kicked out of the county because of all the crime he’s reportedly connected with.
DeKalb County officials gave Charles Butts a one-way ticket out of the suburban Atlanta enclave — along with a warning to never come back — because crime dropped more than 50 percent near Moreland Avenue when he was jailed. He reportedly begged for money during the day and then turned to thievery and pimping at night.
“When the sun went down, he went into his real criminal mastermind self where he started breaking into businesses stealing anything that wasn’t tied down. In fact, some stuff was tied down, and he still stole it,” police Capt. A.T. Mears said, according to WSB-TV.
“We’ve been working on this guy, Charles Butts, for months and it seems like every time he was incarcerated, theft would go down. When he get’s back on the street, theft (would) go right back up,” business owner Wayne Smith said.
“When you come in, you got thievery in the area, people come in, cut your fences, stealing your tires, stealing your batteries, stealing your trucks, stealing your trailers. They’ll steal a whole trailer (and) take it to a recycling plant and sell it for scrap,” Smith added.
Smith and business owners in the DeKalb County business district of Conley are relieved that Butts is gone.
What furthered their resolve, police and business owners say, according to WSBTV.com, is that Butts would be found during the day at multiple intersections along Moreland Avenue, begging.
“His daytime job, basically, he’d stand out here in the intersection. He would hold a sign saying, ‘Help me God bless,’” Mears said.
But Butts reportedly ran a criminal enterprise that include begging, then would steal anything and pimp prostitutes at night.
“He is a one man crime wave,” Mears said.
At the urging of DeKalb business owners, DeKalb police and DeKalb County prosecutors and gave Butts the choice of a year in prison or a ban from DeKalb County.
Butts decided on taking a one-way bus ticket to Tennessee — along with a warning.
“This is great actually. We didn’t solve one victim’s crime; we solved a community’s problem,” Mears said.
Butts understands that if he’s ever seen in DeKalb County again, he can be arrested on sight.
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