In May of this year, Brandy Michelle Holder of Rome, GA was arrested after investigators discovered she withdrew over $4700 from a GoFundMe page she established to benefit the three daughters of a contractor killed in Afghanistan. The deceased — Barry Sutton — had also served as police officer and sheriff’s deputy in Floyd County.
Holder’s GoFundMe campaign was supposed to go toward a memorial duck hunt in the girls’ father’s name, however prosecutors said she withdrew $4,778.32 in September of 2015 and that hunt never happened. It wasn’t until Holder started dodging Sutton’s ex-wife that questions started getting asked. Questions like “hey where the fuck is the money though?”
Now, it takes a special kind of balls to rip off a police officer, even a dead one (RIP, Mr Sutton, and thank you for your service). We can only imagine what went through Ms Holder’s head. Like… maybe no one will notice? It’s not like the community lined the streets of Rome to pay their respects when Mr Sutton’s body returned home from Afghanistan. OH WAIT, that’s actually exactly what happened. In fact, Holder was completely aware of it. Although the GoFundMe campaign has long been vaporized, a breadcrumb remains in this cache (thank ya kindly, Google!). Let’s check out this update posted to the original campaign:
Our community, our state welcomed our HERO home last night. Seeing the videos and pictures and so many people standing as the motorcade rolled through was so overwhelming, it was everything Barry and his daughters deserved in respect. It all still seems so surreal. Our community lost a great man, father, officer, soldier but your memory, your legacy will live on and we will make sure your promises are fulfilled and your girls are taken care of. RIParadise Barry “superman” you will NEVER be forgotten and will forever be a Hometown HERO.
You have to wonder if she believed at that point she was going to do the right thing and, like, maybe some bill came up between then and September? A really, really large bill. She drained the campaign a little over two weeks after Sutton’s body was returned to Georgia.
Holder, 41, was initially charged with felony theft by conversion. She was sentenced today to two years in prison and eight on probation, as well as restitution.
