• Publication: The Athens Observer (Athens, Georgia)
• Author: Elton Manzione
• Original Publication Date: Thursday, June 13, 1996

Athens-Clarke County officials have failed to turn up any evidence that they denied a request by local attorney Ed Tolley to produce documents from the Jennifer Stone investigation.

Tolley’s 1992 request to then Police Chief Ronald Chandler was filed in connection with a divorce case brought by Naomi Fontaine Gaines against Michael E. Gaines.

In the request Tolley sought a “tape recording of a conversation between Naomi Fontaine Gaines and Sgt. W.J. Smith,” in which certain accusations were made against Gaines. Smith is the lead investigator in the Stone murder, and Fontaine Gaines (now Leavell) confirmed she had been questioned regarding a possible link between Michael Gaines and the murder.

Local attorney Scott McLarty had also sought the same material in connection with another case last month. McLarty’s request was met by a filing by the county for a protective order dubbing the material “state secrets.”

Tolley’s request was specific enough to indicate he had knowledge or possession of the material; and his initial request was followed several days later by a second to produce “any notes, reports, or transcripts of a conversation between Ed Walker of the FBI and Fontaine Gaines.” That information was given by Leavell to authorities during the first interview with Smith, indicating Tolley had access to the first before he filed the request to produce the latter.

On May 30 The Athens Observer requested a copy of the county’s response to Tolley’s requests. In a June 6 letter, County Attorney Ernie De Pascale responded officials had “no record which indicates Ed Tolley ever served [the] requests to produce documents which you refer to in your letter.”

The requests, however, each bear a signed certificate of service indicating the documents were served.

One source close to the investigation speculated a leak may have developed which tipped Tolley off to the contents of the files.

“Chief Chandler cannot recall whether or not he received the request, and all inquiries and searches have failed to produce a copy of the request or a copy of any response,” De Pascale continued.

De Pascale concluded that if Tolley served the request on Chandler “no response was ever made to him.”

Under state law the county has refused to allow access to the Stone files as part of an ongoing investigation and the county has responded in writing, as well as in court, to any subsequent request for material from the files. Officials are at a loss to explain why a written or official response to Tolley’s request cannot be located, if in fact he was denied access to the files.

The Athens Observer learned, through an informed source, that the department’s questioning of Fontaine Leavell was the result of statements made by a confidential informant that Michael Gaines was with Jennifer Stone just before she was killed.

De Pascale said, however, that the information given to The Observer by the source was not the same as that person had given to the police.

“I’m not saying this file proves Michael Gaines didn’t do it, but what you’ve been told are not the things that were told by the same people to the police. It’s unfair to the police because it looks like they’ve been overlooking all this,” De Pascale said. He did, however, deny a verbal request to review a transcript of the statements.