FULTON COUNTY, Ga. — An attorney for one of the defendants in the trial involving members of the alleged Young Slime Life gang has bonded out of the Fulton County Jail after being arrested Thursday morning.
Channel 2′s Michael Seiden was at the Fulton County courthouse when Anastasios Manettas was led out in handcuffs moments before the day’s proceedings started. Manettas represents Miles Farley, whose jail phone calls have been a piece of evidence in the trial.
Mannetas is one of more than a dozen attorneys representing the defendants charged in the Young Slime Life gang trial against hip hop superstar Young Thug and his alleged associates.
Fulton County Sheriff Pat Labat said Manettas tried to bring prescription pills into the courthouse at a security checkpoint.
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Manettas was released from the jail on a $5,000 bond just before 9 p.m. on Thursday night. He spoke exclusively to Channel 2 Action News moments after his release.
“They asked to check my bag, and all of a sudden I’m under arrest. All I had in my bag was my own prescribed medications, stored in a lawful way. I didn’t do anything wrong in the whole incident,” Manettas said.
The attorney was charged with not having drugs in an original container, possession of dangerous drugs, possession of a controlled substance, willful obstruction of law enforcement and preventing lawful processions.
Initially, Manettas was charged with simple battery after being accused of throwing his phone at a police officer. That charge was later reduced to willful obstruction after witnesses say he tried throwing his phone to a colleague while handcuffed, but it hit an officer.
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“From the start, this whole thing seemed a bit staged and theatrical,” Manettas said of the arrest when Seiden sat down with him and his lawyer, Brian Tevis, on Friday.
Manettas and Tevis are calling the incident a wrongful arrest.
“The warrants essentially allege that he had a prescription bottle with his prescription medication and there was another dosage of the same medication in the bottle, which is not uncommon for the doctors to say ‘Oh you’re on this many milligrams and we’re going to change it to that and to have them in the same bottle,’”
Manettas called the arrest “humiliating.”
“I’m not a criminal. I’m a patient,” Manettas said. “It felt like some kind of retaliation for something but it didn’t feel good.”
Manettas said he thinks the retaliation came after he accused prosecutors of lying to the court. He made those claims earlier this week during a bond hearing for his client, MIles Farley, who is charged with murder.
“I have not said things to this court that are not true,” Manettas said earlier this week. “But the state has said things to the court that are not true.”
Prosecutors called Mannetas’ comments false and baseless. The state also said they had nothing to do with his arrest or any other issues involving defendants and sheriff’s deputies.
“They should’ve asked the questions first, then made the decisions instead of making arrest and trying to figure out later,” Tevis said.
Since the trial began in January, there have been some incidents involving defendants smuggling drugs and other contraband into the courtroom, so the sheriff’s office decided to implement an extra security checkpoint on the first floor of the courthouse.
On Friay night, Judge Ural Glanville announced Manettas’ client, Miles Farley, will be eligible for a $625,000 bond.
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