Grand jury votes against aggravated assault on police officer charge

By Joe Johnson

A grand jury has declined to indict a man who was accused of assaulting an officer after cutting his wrist in an apparent attempted suicide.

Grand jurors instead indicted 30-year-old Tommy Lee Orr on a charge of making a false statement for telling the officer that he had a gun when he did not.

Orr was arrested on March 5th during an incident in the parking of Microtel Inn & Suites on Ultimate Drive.

His mother had called 911 to report that he was suicidal and she tracked his pickup truck to the hotel.

According a report by Senior Police Officer Jonathan Surine, when he approached the truck Orr told him to stay back because he had a gun.

Using a patrol car for cover and with backup officers in place, Surine kept his rifle trained on Orr as the man complied with every command he was given by police.

At one point, he obeyed an order to exit his truck, at which point he picked up a knife that he had thrown from his truck and returned to the vehicle.

Surine described in his report what happened next:

“Mr. Orr then got back out of the vehicle and was wounded…I noticed there was blood dripping down his arm. He started to advance towards officers. I noticed that he was no longer holding the knife. He was given commands to get on the ground.”

Orr was then arrested without further incident.

When presented with case last Tuesday grand jurors asked to decide whether Orr had committed aggravated assault against Surine “by brandishing a knife while stepping toward Officer Surine, while said officer was engaged in the performance of his official duties.”

They returned a “split indictment,” voting against the assault charge and in favor of the false statement charge.

As of Sunday Orr continued to be held at the Athens jail, where the Oglethorpe County Sheriff’s Office had placed a hold on his release because of a probation violation warrant stemming from a methamphetamine possession conviction.