While in Macon, Giddings called police twice
In her three years in Macon, Lauren Giddings called Macon police to her apartment complex twice.
Once, in early 2009, when her dog was struck by a car, and again last November when someone swiped a dashboard GPS from the console of her tan Mitsubishi Galant.
Nothing in her calls -- or, for that matter, those of any other residents at her Georgia Avenue complex dating back to 2008 -- from the looks of police-dispatch logs obtained Monday by The Telegraph, points to any threatening brushes with anyone who might have wanted to hurt her.
Remains of Giddings’ dismembered body were found June 30 at the apartments that sit across the street from Mercer University’s law school, where Giddings graduated in May.
No one has been charged in connection with the Laurel, Md., native’s slaying.
Police on Monday said they were still awaiting forensic-lab test results from the FBI, acknowledging that at least part of their probe hinges on possible evidence collected from and around three apartments -- one beneath Giddings’, one next door and the slain 27-year-old’s residence.
A former law student who up until a year-and-a half ago lived in Apartment No. 1, beneath the one where Giddings lived, called police one evening in October 2009 to report that someone had been “knocking on doors asking for money,” a dispatch log noted.
Reached by phone at her home in Augusta, the former student, a 25-year-old who left law school to study abroad, said she was “shocked” to hear about her upstairs neighbor’s death and the police probe that now encompasses her former residence and two other dwellings upstairs from it.
The former student said she didn’t feel uneasy living there, “but it’s Macon,” she said.
Police were called to the Barristers Hall apartments at 1058 Georgia Ave., between the city’s main post office on College Street and the Hay House mansion, 11 times between the summer of 2008 and the night Giddings was reported missing.
Of those calls, four have been for “entering auto” cases, three for “suspicious person” calls, all in 2009, and one, the most recent before Giddings’ disappearance, for a car theft in April.
According to a Mercer campus police report, her “close friends” last heard from her about 6 p.m. on June 25. That time frame is consistent with video Macon police have obtained of someone they believe to have been Giddings at a Zaxby’s drive-through in downtown.
The Mercer report, written by officer Vince Broccolo, notes that he arrived at Barristers Hall at 12:33 a.m. on June 30, several hours before Giddings’ torso was found. When he got there, Broccolo’s report states, he met with Giddings’ “close friend” and law-school classmate Ashley Morehouse, 26, a native of upstate New York.
“She and other law student friends advised me that besides not being in contact with any of them since Saturday evening, Ms. Giddings had left all personal items, car, keys, phone, I.D., etc., at her apartment,” according to the Mercer report.
“They then notified (one of Giddings’ sisters) in Maryland. Ms. Giddings’ sister called Macon police to report her sister missing. She was advised that they could not do anything until (Thursday) morning. They then decided to call Mercer police.”
Broccolo’s supervising officer, Sgt. Randy Wilkes, also on the scene, got in touch with Mercer Police Chief Gary Collins, a former Macon police detective, who told his officers to notify city police, who in turn responded, the report stated.
Wilkes, in a supplemental report, noted that “Morehouse stated that the last time Lauren was on Facebook was Saturday evening (June 25). She said that it was very unusual. The scene was turned over to (Macon police).”
To contact writer Joe Kovac Jr., call 744-4397
This story was originally published July 12, 2011 at 12:00 AM with the headline "While in Macon, Giddings called police twice."