National Roundup

Florida
Tattooed ‘Joker’ accused of aiming gun at traffic
MIAMI (AP) — Police in Florida have managed to arrest the Joker without Batman’s help following reports of a green-haired man with tattoos on his face pointing a gun at traffic.

A Miami-Dade police report says 29-year-old Lawrence Sullivan was arrested Tuesday evening and charged with carrying a concealed firearm. A booking photo shows the word “Joker” and a knife-pierced Batman symbol across Sullivan’s forehead, while tattoos of long, stitched cuts are on each side of his mouth. His green hair matches that of the comic book and movie villain.

Police say officers found a loaded handgun on the self-described “tattoo model.”

Kentucky
Trial set for Amish community members over horse droppings
RUSSELLVILLE, Ky. (AP) — Members of an Amish community in Kentucky may take their cases to court after being cited for violating an ordinance requiring horses to wear bags to catch their droppings.

The Bowling Green Daily News reports 13 members of the Swartzentruber Amish sect in Auburn appeared in court Wednesday and were told their trials will begin Aug. 2 if they can’t settle the cases before then. The defendants belong to a conservative sect that rejects motor vehicles and most modern technology and travel by horse-drawn buggies. They believe the bags violate their community’s religious standards.

The city says the ordinance is meant to promote safety.

A total of 37 cases are pending against 13 people.

The judge set a pretrial conference for attorneys July 19.

Nevada
Man gets life in prison in 2012 kidnap-slaying
LAS VEGAS (AP) — A 38-year-old man has been sentenced to spend the rest of his life in state prison for killing an 18-year-old and wounding another man in a kidnapping and double-shooting that a judge called “staggeringly offensive.”

Mario Camacho’s court-appointed attorney didn’t immediately respond Thursday to messages about whether he’ll appeal the sentence in the February 2012 killing of Frank Wiest in Camacho’s home garage in North Las Vegas.

Camacho also was found guilty in February of kidnapping a teenage girl and attempted murder for critically wounding a 20-year-old man.

Another defendant, 42-year-old Eric Robinson, was sentenced to 70 years to life in prison for his role in the killing.

Maine
Judge orders broadcasters to produce tapes
PORTLAND, Maine (AP) — A judge has ordered Maine broadcasters to produce unaired tapes of prosecutor interviews in a murder case.

The Portland Press Herald reports the Maine Public Broadcasting Network and WGME-TV have seven days to comply with Monday’s order to hand over outtakes from interviews with Pamela Ames. Ames is a former assistant attorney general who won a conviction against Anthony Sanborn Jr. in the 1989 murder of his childhood girlfriend Jessica Briggs.

Sanborn served 27 years in prison before being released on bail in April after a witness recanted.

Sanborn’s attorney says Sanborn was the victim of prosecutorial misconduct. In interviews with MPBN and WGME, Ames says she never pressured witnesses.

News directors from both stations filed affidavits saying the release would create a “chilling effect” on future news gathering.

Massachusetts
Man lunges at co-defendant at end of trial
BOSTON (AP) — One of four people charged with murder lunged at a co-defendant and shouted profanities and “I’m not going to forget!” while their guilty verdicts were being read in a Boston courtroom.

Omar Bonner, Omar Denton, Andrew Robertson, and Javaine Watson were convicted Wednesday in the December 2013 shooting death of 25-year-old Romeo McCubbin in the city’s Dorchester neighborhood.

The Boston Herald reports that during the reading of the verdicts, Watson lunged at Robertson and shouted at him before being dragged out. The judge called it “pandemonium.”

Prosecutors say Watson drove Robertson to the scene, Robertson shot McCubbin repeatedly as he sat in his vehicle and Watson drove them away. Bonner and Denton then approached on foot. Bonner shot McCubbin again and Denton kicked him as he lay on the ground.

South Carolina
Woman sentenced in baby death wants to take back guilty plea
SOCASTEE, S.C. (AP) — A South Carolina woman who pleaded guilty to homicide by child abuse in January wants to take back her plea.

The Sun News reports 34-year-old Sarah Toney asked for a trial and jury to redecide her fate in a motion submitted May 18, which is under consideration by a judge.

Toney — sentenced to 27 years in jail in the 2015 drowning death of her five-month-old daughter — says her plea was “unlawfully induced” and public defender Jonathan Fox didn’t adequately represent her.
Toney says experts weren’t called to testify on her mental health.

Drug tests showed she was under the influence of methamphetamine and opioids when she walked into a creek holding her daughter. Fox pleaded for leniency in sentencing, saying Toney was sexually abused as a child.

Delaware
Man seeks to withdraw guilty plea in 2007 cold-case killing
WILMINGTON, Del. (AP) — A man already serving life in prison for a murder in Georgia is asking to withdraw his guilty plea in the 2007 killing of his roommate at a Delaware mobile home park.

Jason Slaughter pleaded guilty in January to second-degree murder in the death of 22-year-old Christopher Masters.

A judge has scheduled a hearing Thursday on Slaughter’s request to withdraw his plea.

Slaughter was found shot outside Masters’ home, and Masters was found dead inside. Slaughter told police they had been shot in a home invasion.

Georgia police contacted Delaware authorities in 2010 after charging Slaughter and his wife in a fatal shooting, for which they both were convicted of murder.

Authorities have said Slaughter was the beneficiary of life insurance policies on both the Georgia and Delaware shooting victims.