Brutal attack leads to new safety measures on popular trail

ATLANTA — Paulding County sheriff's deputies toured parts of the Atlanta BeltLine Tuesday to get a better idea how to use video cameras to prevent future crimes.

Three weeks ago, Tina Waddell was brutally attacked on the Silver Comet Trail in Paulding County. She continues to recover after the attack left her badly bruised and in intensive care.

Police are still searching for the man responsible for the attack.

"At this point, we're still following up on a few leads," said Paulding County Deputy Sheriff Cpl. Ashley Henson.  "Unfortunately, we haven't had that break that we need to just open this case up."

Paulding County commissioners recently voted to divert special-purpose local-option sales tax funds meant for parks and recreation so the county could purchase nearly 50 brand new, high-definition digital cameras. Officials plan to place those cameras at nearly two dozen locations along the Silver Comet Trail.

Deputies met with the Atlanta Police Department's BeltLine Path Force to see how the city is able to coordinate the cameras along the BeltLine and feed all the video into a centralized location.

Only Channel 2's Richard Elliot was there as APD took the deputies on a tour.

"We're all in it together when it comes to trail safety," said APD Path Force Commander Lt. Jeff Baxter.  "We're happy to have the officials here from the Silver Comet Trail today to kind of show them how our camera system works, and how we keep people safe here on the BeltLine."

Henson said the reward fund leading to an arrest and capture in the Waddell case is now up to $23,000.

WSBTV