National Roundup

Florida
Town accidentally sells municipal water tower
BROOKSVILLE, Fla. (AP) — A small town in Florida accidentally sold its water tower in a blundered real estate transaction.

A businessman purchased a municipal building underneath the city of Brooksville’s water tower last April for $55,000 with the goal of converting it into a gym. However, when Bobby Read went to the county to get an address for his new business location, he was told the parcel he bought included the entire water tower site, according to the Tampa Bay Times.

Luckily for the town, Read was willing to give it back. County records show he transferred the water tower back to Brooksville through a warranty deed last month. The town of 8,500 residents is located 50 miles (80 kilometers) north of Tampa.

“I don’t know where the blame falls here,” said Blake Bell, a city council member. “We’re council members and we rely on the city manager. We assume that he has done his due diligence.”
City Manager Mark Kutney blamed the use of a bad legal description for what happened. The city’s redevelopment agency director resigned after the accidental sale.

New Jersey
Judge: 4 police officers shouldn’t have been fired after search
HACKENSACK, N.J. (AP) — For the second time in more than three years, an administrative law judge has recommended reinstatement of four of the New Jersey police officers fired after the city of Hackensack said they engaged in a warrantless search of an apartment in late 2016.

NJ.com reports that Judge Andrew Baron said Thursday that Hackensack should not have fired Sgt. Justin de la Bruyere, Det. Rocco Duardo, Det. Mark Gutierrez and Officer Victor Vazquez.

The four and three since-retired officers were suspended in 2017 after they were accused of an unlawful search of an apartment and then falsifying a police report to cover it up. Then-Bergen County prosecutor Gurbir S. Grewal, now state attorney general, dismissed eight criminal cases and told Hackensack prosecutors not to pursue others.

Baron said the officers were never given a fair chance to dispute their “Brady list” designation as officers whose history of lying would have to be disclosed to defense attorneys in criminal cases. A defense attorney earlier called the designation a “scarlet letter B” that made it nearly impossible for an officer to get a job in law enforcement.

Baron’s decision is a recommendation that the state civil service commission can uphold, amend or disagree with. City attorneys and lawyers for the officers can also file exceptions to the recommendation ahead of the commission’s decision.

In February 2019, another administrative law judge decided that the four officers and a since-retired detective should be reinstated. The commission upheld most of that recommendation but said two of the officers should be fired.

Attorney Charles Sciarra, who represents the officers, called Baron’s decision “vindication” that his clients shouldn’t have been fired in the first place.

Hackensack spokesman Phil Swibinski said the city was already preparing its opposition to the recommendation and officials “absolutely stand by their decision to terminate these officers due to their egregious conduct.” He said the city will dispute Baron’s conclusion that the officers didn’t have a chance to dispute the Brady designation.

Pennsylvania
Judge declines to dismiss charges in case of body kept in a freezer
YORK, Pa. (AP) — A Pennsylvania judge declined to dismiss some charges and suppress part of a statement by a woman accused of keeping her maternal grandmother’s remains in a freezer for a decade and a half and continuing to receive the dead woman’s Social Security checks for a portion of that time.

The York Daily Record reports that the York County judge on Friday rejected defense arguments that the statute of limitations had expired for charges of theft and receiving stolen property against 62-year-old Cynthia Black.

In July of last year, Black agreed to allow a judge to decide based on allegations in court documents whether there was enough evidence for trial, and prosecutors agreed in return not to add counts of neglect of a care-dependent person and unsworn falsification to authorities. Black is also charged with abuse of a corpse.

Police were summoned to a foreclosed home in Dillsburg in February 2019 after two potential buyers reported finding skeletal remains in a white chest freezer. DNA was used to identify the remains, which were in black garbage bags, as those of Glenora Reckord Delahay, born in 1906.

State police allege that Black told them she found her grandmother dead in their home in Ardmore in 2004 but kept the body in a basement freezer, which she moved to Dillsburg in 2007, and used federal Social Security payments to cover the mortgage. Police said Social Security paid $186,000 for Delahay from 2001 to 2010.

Defense attorneys argued that police should have read their client her Miranda rights when they interviewed her. Prosecutors argued successfully that law enforcement lacked “actual knowledge” of any crime until the remains were identified in 2020 and Black wasn’t in custody during her interview.

Earlier in the hearing, prosecutors conceded that the statute of limitations had expired on the original theft chrage but were able to add a new count.

Indiana
Judge rejects new trial for man convicted in murder-for-hire
MUNCIE, Ind. (AP) — A central Indiana judge has rejected a new trial for a man convicted in the 1993 murder-for-hire slaying of a woman found shot to death in her garage.

Jess David Woods was convicted in 2009 of murder and conspiracy to commit murder in Teresa French’s May 1993 killing and sentenced to 100 years in prison.

Woods was hired by the Muncie woman’s estranged husband to kill the 29-year-old mother of three.

In his bid for post-conviction relief, Woods and his attorney claimed authorities had not pursued evidence suggesting Anthony French could have fatally shot his wife.

Woods, 69, also said last year that his hearing problems had prevented him from understanding witness testimony at his 2009 trial.

But in a ruling released Thursday, Delaware County Judge Wolf said that Woods had “failed to prove how any of the alleged claims, even if true, individually or collectively would have changed the outcome of the trial.”

Delaware County Prosecutor Eric Hoffman said Friday in a statement that “society is much safer given the fact that Woods will spend the rest of his natural life in prison.”

Anthony French, 60, was convicted of murder and conspiracy to commit murder in his wife’s death by a Delaware County jury in 2008 and sentenced to 80 years in prison.