A local woman who allegedly called 911 multiple times making false claims of emergencies, including meth on her grocery bags and her house being burned down, was charged with a misdemeanor Saturday.
Anna Marie Chase, 59, of 284 Bryant Road, was taken into custody at her residence shortly before 5 p.m. and charged with a misdemeanor count of communicating a false alarm, punishable by up to one year in jail. She was later released on a $1,000 bond and is set to appear May 24 in Garland County District Court.
Chase was previously convicted of a felony count of second-degree battery after a one-day trial in Garland County Circuit Court on Dec. 18, 2014, and sentenced to five years in prison, with all of it suspended. The charge involved assaulting a 63-year-old disabled woman who suffered multiple injuries that required surgery.
According to the probable cause affidavit on Saturday's arrest, shortly before 9:30 a.m. Saturday, Garland County sheriff's Cpl. Matthew Cogburn responded to Chase's residence regarding a public assist in which the dispatchers "were not really sure what the problem was" but the caller was demanding to see a deputy.
He arrived and spoke to Chase, who was holding several grocery store bags and stated there was meth on them. When asked how she knew that, she said she "probably used some" and that the bags "glowed in the dark." He asked her if she had used meth and she reportedly said, "No. I did. I used to. I'm not sure. But my neighbor has been drugged."
After checking that Chase knew the day, month, year and who was president, Cogburn told her the bags were empty and didn't have meth on them and warned her not to call 911 unless she had an actual emergency.
The affidavit notes that throughout the day, dispatchers received eight more 911 calls from Chase. Cogburn attempted to call her several times, but she would not answer the phone. Around 4:15 p.m., when she called 911 for a tenth time stating she was "seeing people" Cogburn returned to her residence.
He located Chase sitting in a shed and her neighbor was sitting in a chair in his yard. He asked the neighbor what was going on and he said, "She's coming, but there isn't anyone here." Cogburn asked Chase why she called 911 and she reportedly stated she "needed to talk about someone burning down her house."
At that point, Cogburn took Chase into custody on the communicating a false alarm charge.