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By DAVE WEISS; Times Leader Correspondent
Saturday, March 13, 1999 Page: 3A
WILKES-BARRE – The city’s Crime Watch Coalition is content with a judge’s
decision to lift all of Deborah Thurston’s arrest warrants.
Thurston, 43, was wanted on several warrants for failing to appear in court
for hearings regarding two drug cases.
On Friday, Luzerne County Court of Common Pleas Judge Michael Conahan
agreed to lift all arrest warrants for Thurston, as long as she gets a job
within five days, seeks counseling, tests clean for drugs, notifies the
probation department of her address, and – as a previous condition of her bail
– stays away from Holland Street.
But probation officers testified Friday that Thurston previously registered
a non-existent address as her residence. They said that on Friday they could
not find 234 South Grant Street.
Conahan threatened Thurston with more jail time if she continued to give
false information about her residence.
“Stop all your shenanigans,” Conahan told Thurston. “That’s the bottom
line. If (a probation officer) goes to that address and you’re not there, he’s
going to lodge you.”
Following the hearing, Thurston said the coalition is on a witch hunt
against her. She said the coalition continues to follow her wherever she moves
and calls her employers to inform them about her prior drug abuse.
“This happened two years ago and they’re still on my ass,” she said.
Thurston said she told the court her correct address on March 5 and said
the probation department checked a wrong house.
Dave Nesbitt, a member of the Wilkes-Barre Crime Watch Coaltion who
attended the hearing, said Thurston is the reason he got involved with crime
watch.