Threat recipient says dead officer was unstable - WALB.com, Albany News, Weather, Sports

Threat recipient says dead officer was unstable

Corporal Andrew Hayslip Corporal Andrew Hayslip
Dougherty District Attorney Ken Hodges Dougherty District Attorney Ken Hodges

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September 22, 2004

Albany-- Corporal Andrew Hayslip was arrested in March 2003 for domestic violence against LaDonna Wilkerson and for threatening Stanley Roberts. He went through a pre-trial Intervention program that included anger management counseling, then returned to his job.

The man officer Hayslip threatened who says he should never have been allowed to remain on the force.

But Dougherty District Attorney Ken Hodges says pre trial intervention was the right choice after Officer Andrew Hayslip was accused of threatening to kill a man. "Based on everything I knew then, I think it was the right decision, and I don't second guess that decision."

But the man Hayslip threatened, Stanley Roberts, differs. "You can't allow a person that threatens someone to kill them and they are back on the force the next week."

Hayslip attended eight sessions of anger management at Greenleaf, and was certified by his counselor to return to work. "Regardless of them sending him to anger management is not enough when you know a person is suicidal," Roberts says.

But Hodges says the case was based on he said- she said evidence, and he had to take into account Hayslip's record. "When it's a first offense, a long history of no other problems, an isolated incident. Someone who we think would benefit from counseling," Hodges said.

Roberts says he warned authorities. "Then I write the DA and tell him the next time, he's going to carry out the threat and that was disregarded."

Hodges said "I can not fathom a connection between that incident and these two, and then shooting his own four-year-old son and then shooting himself. "

Police officers were shocked by the murder suicide, but Roberts says warning signs were there. "And he had friends on the force, that knew, that knew," said Roberts.

D. A. Hodges says he has no doubts that pre-trial intervention is a good tool in domestic violence cases, and will continue to rely on it. Hodges says even if Hayslip had been kicked off the force, the misdemeanor charge would not have kept him from owning a handgun.

posted at 5:22PM by dave.miller@walb.com