Collection officer tells his side

‘I just couldn’t take the chance there would be folks on the jury who have had a bad experience with a collection agency,’ said Dewayne Ramsey, who entered a no-contest plea last week before Circuit Court Judge Bart Stanley to an incident which happened last year at Waffle House. ‘I’m on unsupervised probation so I can get on with my life. I just couldn’t take the chance the fibbers would get up there and be believed.’

Ramsey, who recently finished nursing school, said he entered the collection business a few years ago out of necessity and that he has a good reputation.

‘I needed a job and I needed to support my family,’ Ramsey said.

Ramsey was accused of harassing and grabbing the arm of Waffle House employee Rochelle Anderson last summer as he was there discussing her debt owed to World Finance ‘ a debt Anderson admitted in court she owed. During the discussion in the restaurant, Anderson maintained Ramsey grabbed her arm and tried to usher her to the door, something Ramsey said is not accurate.

‘If I’d done something like that, I’d hope somebody would have gotten up and hit me upside my head,’ said Ramsey, noting he never touched the woman. ‘She didn’t take out the warrants until several days later, and then she said that she did because her boss told her to. That doesn’t make a bit of sense.’

In the end, Ramsey said he felt it was in his best interest to plead no contest to an offense he does not believe he committed as the agreement saw prosecutors drop the assault charge and approve a judicial diversion which will allow his record to be erased at the end of his probationary period.