The convictions of three members of a Peachtree City family were vacated by an order issued Tuesday in Fayette County State Court.

Kevin and Carolyn O'Keefe were found guilty by a six-member State Court jury in April of obstruction of a law enforcement officer and maintaining a disorderly house, while son Thomas Patrick O'Keefe was convicted of simple battery. The charges stemmed from an incident in 1998 where Peachtree City police investigated a call about a disturbance in the vicinity of the O'Keefe home.

Paul Weiner, representing the O'Keefes, argued during the four-day trial that police entered the home unnecessarily and improperly, setting off a chain of events that resulted in the arrest of his clients. Six months later, Judge Fletcher Sams ultimately agreed.

Sams ruled that “as a matter of law there was insufficient probable cause to justify the initial entry into the defendants' home, which therefore rendered the officer's presence in the home illegal,” according to his written order.

Since the charges came as a result of the defendants' response to the police inside their home, “the convictions cannot stand,” he said.

The defendants had submitted a motion for a new trial, but Sams found that it was unnecessary and instead ordered a directed verdict of not guilty.

According to the order, prosecutors entered into evidence a 911 call from a home on Nettlecure Court, where the O'Keefes live, at about 2:15 in the morning complaining of loud noises behind the house. Upon answering the complaint, officers found noise coming instead from the O'Keefe home.

Several people were found in the front yard, one of whom ran as police approached. That person was caught and the others secured on the front lawn, while an officer approached the O'Keefes' front door and found it open.

The officer “did not ring the doorbell, did not knock on the door, and did not announce his presence, but proceeded through the threshold of the front door toward the defendants' kitchen, where he encountered Kevin O'Keefe,” the order stated. “All of the alleged criminal violations of the O'Keefe defendants flow from their response to the officers' presence in their home.”

None of the officers saw or heard anything coming from inside the house prior to their entry, and no complaint was received by police regarding any activity inside the house, Sams wrote.

As the trial commenced, neither the defense nor the prosecution requested that the court define “probable cause,” and the court did not issue a definition, according to Sams. That alone would be sufficient grounds for a new trial, he said, but in this case it would not be necessary, as he cited Fourth Amendment provisions on search and seizure as well as relevant cases relating to probable cause in explaining his reversal of the verdict.

“This court has taken into account all circumstances facing the officers in the heat of the moment,” the judge's order stated. “In reflective hindsight, however, the court is able to more thoroughly review its own decisions... if convinced the defendants' rights were not upheld, this court has a sworn duty to correct any error.”

Attorney Teresa Weiner said Tuesday that while she and her clients are certainly thrilled over this development, the case is not over.

The O'Keefes plan to file a federal lawsuit against the Police Department and the city based on injuries suffered by Carolyn O'Keefe during the incident, Weiner said. She has already had one back surgery and faces another, he said.

Testimony during the trial by her orthopedic surgeon was that the actions taken by police were tantamount to “a knee in the back,” Weiner said, adding that Carolyn O'Keefe is already on permanent disability.

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