VARNELL, Ga. — When the Varnell City Council’s almost three-hour meeting concluded on Wednesday morning, City Hall had a much different look.

Out was councilman Sheldon Fowler, who resigned. Put on administrative leave was Police Chief Lyle Grant. Elevated to run the police department was Lt. Greg Fowler. And the City Council planned to ask the Georgia Bureau of Investigation to step in.

But before the GBI can look into how Grant responded to a domestic call at the home of Sheldon Fowler on June 13, the district attorney will first have to determine there is at least the possibility the chief broke the law, a GBI special agent said.

“We haven’t been contacted by the district attorney yet,” said GBI Special-Agent-in-Charge Greg Ramey. “If there’s no crime, we don’t investigate. If someone didn’t respond appropriately on a case or violated department policy or something like that, that would not be something we would handle.”

Members of the Varnell City Council met in executive session, closed to the media and public, for more than two hours Wednesday to discuss a June 13 incident at Sheldon Fowler’s home which Grant and Greg Fowler (no relation to Sheldon Fowler) responded to.

Sheldon Fowler cursed Grant and Greg Fowler and poked them in the chest with his finger, according to an incident report Grant filed. In that report, Grant wrote that “officers were tolerant of his behavior because of his position on the Varnell City Council.” Grant did not arrest Sheldon Fowler that night but instead asked his wife and their two adult daughters to leave the house.

Grant sought a warrant for Sheldon Fowler’s arrest nine days later and two days after other council members became aware of the incident and viewed video from Grant’s body camera.

Sheldon Fowler turned himself in Tuesday on charges of simple assault, simple battery against a law enforcement officer and disorderly conduct. He was released Tuesday from the Whitfield County Jail on a $2,000 bond.

After council members returned from executive session on Wednesday, Mayor Pro Tem David Owens said he was using his power as acting mayor to place Grant on paid administrative leave pending a GBI investigation.

City Attorney Terry Miller said Owens had that authority under the city charter in the absence of Mayor Anthony Hulsey, who is out of town on vacation this week. Miller said he planned to seek a meeting with District Attorney Bert Poston Wednesday afternoon to ask him to request a GBI investigation.

When asked for comment on the mayor’s announcement, Grant simply walked away without speaking.

Owens said Greg Fowler is acting chief while Grant is on leave. Council members said they did not have any concerns about his role in the response to the incident at Sheldon Fowler’s home.

“Lt. Fowler was really in the background there,” said Owens. “Chief Grant was the one who determined how that was handled.”

Owens also said Sheldon Fowler had agreed to resign from Seat 4 on the council effective Monday. That was a turnaround from the start of the meeting.

Before going into executive session, council members met in an open session, which began with Sheldon Fowler apologizing for his conduct on June 13.

“I would like to apologize to the police chief and all the Varnell police officers,” he said. “I would like to apologize to the mayor and council, and I would like to apologize to the people of Varnell, and I would ask for your prayers.”

Council member Jan Pourquoi later motioned to approve a resolution requesting that Sheldon Fowler resign, citing what he’d seen on the video recorded by Grant’s body camera. Pourquoi said he could only watch a portion of the video of the incident because it was so “disgusting.”

“I see Mr. Fowler clearly intoxicated,” he said. “I see him calling one of his children, and I will abbreviate the word he used, an ‘effing retard.'”

Pourquoi said it is his understanding that the daughter has cognitive disabilities.

Pourquoi said he was also disturbed by the wife’s statement on the video about having to stop Fowler from going into their grown daughters’ rooms.

“I see one of his children saying, ‘This happens every night,'” he said.

Asked after the meeting why he did not request that council member Andrea Gordy resign last year after she was charged with simple battery in a domestic dispute, Pourquoi said there were two big differences in the two cases.

“First, there was no question that she did not receive preferential treatment,” he said. “In her case, the officers who responded immediately called the sheriff’s office and turned it over to them.”

Gordy is scheduled for a pre-trial conference in that case in August.

But Pourquoi said the biggest difference was that there was no video of Gordy, but council members had been able to watch video of Fowler. He said he was particularly disturbed to actually see and hear Fowler’s verbal abuse of his children and his behavior towards police officers.

Pourquoi, Gordy and council member Ashlee Godfrey voted in favor of the resolutuion asking Fowler to resign. When Owens asked Fowler for his reaction, he said he had no intention “at this time” of resigning.

But about 40 minutes into the executive session, he left by a side door and got into his truck and drove off.

Sheldon Fowler did not immediately return a telephone message after the meeting. He had been on the council since 2010.

“He indicated to us that he had thought about resigning two weeks ago for completely unrelated matters and he came here today intending to resign, but after the vote, he made a quick emotional decision,” said Owens. “After talking to us, he said he realized resigning would be the best thing for himself and for the city.”

Council members said there will be a special election to fill the final two years Sheldon Fowler’s term in November on the same date as the regular city election.

Owens concluded the meeting by asking if any members of the public wished to speak. Debra Pourquoi, wife of council member Jan Pourquoi and one of only two people other than media to attend, asked to speak.

“As a mother and a wife and as a female, I thought someone had to speak out for the victim,” she said. “I would hate to think that if this happened to me and I called 911 that the chief of police would remove me from my home and my children instead of the person perpetrating a crime. That’s revictimizing the victim.”

To read Varnell Police Chief Lyle Grant’s response to questions about the Sheldon Fowler (member of the Varnell City Council) incident on June 13, read this story at www.dailycitizen.news.