Former Georgia school official accused of poisoning wife with cocaine denied bail

BIBB COUNTY, Ga. - A former Georgia school administrator accused of poisoning his ailing wife with a cocaine overdose has been denied bail after prosecutors told a judge that recorded telephone conversations showed him trying to gather a passport and cash.

The Telegraph of Macon reports that Edward Judie Jr., charged with felony murder in the 2019 death of his wife, was denied bail Thursday by Bibb County Superior Court Judge Howard Simms.

Joyce Fox Judie, 60, was found dead in November 2019 at the couple’s suburban home in northwest Macon. Ed Judie, 66, told deputies at the time that he and his wife had been drinking and he thought she had fallen asleep.

An autopsy found that Joyce Judie had "many times the lethal dose" of cocaine in her body when she died. Investigators say they determined that Ed Judie had bought cocaine that night.

An arrest warrant states Judie poisoned his wife "by introducing into her system cocaine," adding that Joyce Judie was "being treated for dementia." Ed Judie was arrested July 1 by sheriff’s deputies.

Prosecutors told Simms of the conversations shortly after Judie’s lawyer, Gregory Bushway, had argued in a video hearing that Judie wasn’t a flight risk, describing him as a former public employee and Army Ranger who "has served his country valiantly."

"Mr. Judie denies the allegations in this case," Bushway said of the murder charge.

But prosecutor Sandra Matson said Judie "completely is" a flight risk, describing several recorded phone calls Judie made from the Bibb County jail.

Matson said Judie can be heard "advising people to help him secure his passport ... He is also talking about committing an appraisal on a house to sell it to get money and cash. And he’s also (in the calls) referencing getting the life insurance proceeds from his deceased wife’s account to someone else, to get it out of his bank account into someone else’s to hide it."

Matson said insurance proceeds amounted to about $500,000.

Simms denied bail but asked Matson to give him a copy of the recorded calls so that he could determine whether "there are other possible interpretations." If so, the judge said, he might reconsider his bail ruling.

Judie was deputy superintendent of student affairs for the Bibb County school district from July 2011 to Sept. 2015. After a new superintendent replaced him, Judie consulted for a charter school.

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