ATLANTA — Days after he was released from jail, police say they caught Chiquille Bell dealing drugs and guns from a storefront in an Atlanta neighborhood.
Channel 2 investigative reporter Mark Winne was at the Fulton County Jail to speak with Bell’s defense attorney to get his side of things.
Documents reviewed by Winne suggest Bell got a deal on July 28 that could be considered a great outcome from a DeKalb County case, but a Fulton County indictment alleges Bell was breaking the law again by Aug. 3.
If the allegations are true, things might’ve turned out differently for Bell, had he taken a different route.
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Documents show he was given probation on some charges and received a favorable outcome on gang-related charges in DeKalb County, days before a Fulton County indictment suggested he was breaking the law.
An indictment against Bell and two others brought gang-related charges, allegations of drug trafficking and possession of a firearm by a convicted felon.
Atlanta police Maj. Ralph Woolfolk said simultaneous raids on Aug. 9 at a warehouse and supposed grocery store on Lakewood Avenue, and a house nearby where Bell was arrested, netted more than 46 pounds of marijuana, plus drugs including Oxycodone, Xanax, illegal psychedelic mushrooms, amphetamines, and at least five guns, some of which were stolen.
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Winne asked Woolfolk if Bell had become a convicted felon just before the new indictment.
“Just days before,” Woolfolk confirmed. “And this is just a testament to just the great work that the men and women of the Atlanta Police Department do. This was a complete criminal enterprise. This was an operation which was causing a lot of issues within that particular area of town.”
Bell’s attorney Ben Githieya said that his client maintains his innocence and that he is innocent of the charges. He said he’s confident Bell will be exonerated and that he is not a gang member.
Instead, Githieya said Bell was accused of being in a gang because of which neighborhood he grew up in. Woolfolk said that’s not the case.
A DeKalb County sentencing document from July 28 shows Bell accepted a plea deal to a reduced charge of conspiracy to commit burglary in the second degree and conspiracy to commit a felony. It was a charge involving an attempt to unlawfully enter a tow yard to find a trafficking weight of heroin, for which he got two years of probation.
A document indicates two gang-type charges were nolle prossed.
Githieya said that a DeKalb County judge indicated if Bell met certain conditions, including no subsequent arrests or convictions, his probation period could have ended at 12 months.
“Chiquille Bell is not a drug dealer. Chiquille Bell is a family man,” Githieya said of his client.
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Woolfolk said Bell’s latest indictment, and the indictments of two other suspects in Fulton County, are being prosecuted by the Georgia Attorney General’s Office Gang Unit.
“This was part of an ongoing operation,” Woolfolk told Channel 2 Action News. “Operation Heatwave.”
“We’re proud that we have this authority now to go after gangs because I think if you look at who is terrorized most often by gangs, it’s lower-income, racially diverse neighborhood populations. It’s really [the] vulnerable folks in our state,” Attorney General Chris Carr said.
Bell’s record showed arrests both in Fulton County and DeKalb County. The DeKalb County District Attorney’s Office provided comment to Channel 2 Action News about the case from the AG’s office.
“We are aware of the indictment of Chiquille Bell and are cooperating fully with the Office of the Attorney General on their investigation. We previously assisted APD on matters related to this Defendant and others and on 9/19/23 a probation violation arrest warrant was issued for Bell,” a spokesperson for the DeKalb County DA’s office said in a statement.
Bell’s attorney defended his client’s innocence.
“Chiquille Bell is not a violent individual,” Githieya said.
Channel 2 Action News used video and photos obtained from the Atlanta Police Department for this story.
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