Judge tosses one count against Velvet Riggins - WALB.com, Albany News, Weather, Sports

Judge Stephen Goss threw out count one - public record fraud, which is a felony. 

The defense tried to get this count thrown out before the trial began, but the judge wanted to wait until the state presented their evidence. 

The state has rested its case against the DCSS board member. 

The judge sent the jury to lunch about 1:10PM.  The defense is expected to call at least one witness after the break. 

Thursday the state called two more witnesses to the stand.  Ladainial Hooper, the Lincoln Elementary school cafeteria manager was the first witness of the day. 

Prosecutor Heather Lanier asked Hooper about whether she saw Riggins child eating school lunch.  Hooper says she saw the child in the lunch line but could not recall if he actually ate school lunch. 

The state then called J. C. Phillips, an investigator for the Dougherty County School System.  Lanier asked Phillips to examine free and reduced lunch applications filled out by Riggins dating back to 2007, attempting to show past discrepancies on previous applications.  

Yesterday, the former school nutrition director, Vanessa Hayes testified saying the 2011 application in question should of not be submitted to the USDA.  

In Wednesday's testimony, former school nutrition director, Vanessa Hayes, testified that Riggins' application submitted in September 2010 should have been red flagged by the system.

She said it did not meet requirements of completion to be submitted to the USDA. She said it should have never been processed.

The defense raised questions over potential mistakes by school police and the school nutrition service over its handling of Riggins' free lunch documents, particularly one that led to her arrest.

More later from WALB....