Nausea rose in me.
So this was how it worked. Arrest a landowner on a charge that wouldn’t stick. Set the bail high enough that they couldn’t pay it. Hold them for weeks while they lost their jobs, missed their property tax payments, and fell behind on bills. When the county put the land up for a tax sale, or when an old widow died and her family couldn’t afford to fight the estate, Pinecrest Holdings was waiting with a check.
“Mrs. Greene’s forty-two acres on Cypress Creek,” Delgado said. “Pinecrest bought them at an estate sale four months after her death for $61,000. Georgia Power has since offered $238,000 for an easement across a fifteen-acre strip of that parcel alone.”
Voss finally found his voice.
“That’s my brother-in-law’s business. It’s got nothing to do with me.”
“Then you won’t mind,” Agent Greer said, “explaining why the Pell County Sheriff’s Office bank records show three wire transfers from Pinecrest Holdings to an account in your wife’s name. Totaling $187,500.”
