Georgia mayor who fired town’s entire police force resigns, citing family ‘health concerns’

Key points

• The mayor of a small town in the US state of Georgia has resigned shortly after firing his community’s entire police department, a step that the local governing council ultimately reversed – but that he nonetheless took amid a political spat pitting him and his wife against members of the force.
• In a 15 May resignation letter that the Guardian reviewed, Ron Shinnick avoided mentioning his attempted termination of the Cohutta police department, word of which gained international media attention.
• The letter instead said Shinnick had opted to vacate the mayoral post he had held since 2014 due to “health concerns” faced by family members outside Cohutta.
• “This decision was not made lightly,” Shinnick wrote in his resignation letter, to which he assigned immediate effect.
• “But I believe it is in the best interest of both the town and myself at this time.” Shinnick, 70, had dismissed Cohutta’s police chief...