Florida man's voter fraud charges dismissed in blow to DeSantis.

NEW YORK (Reuters) - One of the 20 people arrested for voting illegally as part of Florida Governor Ron DeSantis' effort to crack down on voter fraud had his charges dismissed on Friday.

A Miami state judge threw out the case against Robert Lee Wood, ruling that the statewide prosecutor, who is overseeing all 20 cases, had no jurisdiction because the alleged crime did not occur in at least two judicial circuits.

The decision could pave the way for similar findings in some or all of the other cases, though local prosecutors could still choose to refile the charges. The governor's office said the state would appeal the ruling.

DeSantis, a Republican who is running for re-election as governor on Nov. 8 and is widely thought to be weighing a 2024 presidential campaign, touted the arrests in August as the "first salvo" from his newly created Office of Election Crimes and Security.

The agency, which includes state law enforcement officers, was established amid a nationwide push by Republicans to tighten voting laws in the wake of former President Donald Trump's false claims that the 2020 election was stolen.

The ruling on Friday came two days after the Tampa Bay Times published police body camera footage taken during the arrests that showed several defendants appearing baffled by the charges.

All 20 are former inmates convicted of murder or felony sex crimes. A 2018 constitutional amendment restored voting rights for many ex-convicts but specifically excluded people who committed those offenses.

In the videos, several defendants said they had been allowed to vote by election officials and did not understand why they were being arrested. Under state law, voter fraud requires intent.

In Wood's case, prosecutors argued that his ballot, cast in Miami, was eventually sent to Tallahassee to be tallied, thus fulfilling the requirement for the crime to occur in two separate locations.

But Judge Milton Hirsch agreed with Wood's defense attorney that Wood had nothing to do with the transfer of ballots from one place to another.

"Here, all the criminal misconduct, if there was any, was performed by one man in one county," the judge wrote in his order.

Wood's attorney, Larry Davis, said prosecutors should abandon the case. Wood registered to vote after being told he was allowed, received a voter card and cast a ballot, all without any objection, Davis said.

"There's no way he would have done so without being told it was OK," Davis said in a phone interview. "My client had absolutely no intent to break the law."

In a statement, a DeSantis spokesperson, Bryan Griffin, said, "The state will continue to enforce the law and ensure that murderers and rapists who are not permitted to vote do not unlawfully do so."

(Reporting by Joseph Ax; Editing by Colleen Jenkins and Daniel Wallis)

Reposted by Ricardo Martinez

Jury reaches decision on sentence of Parkland school shooter.

FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. (AP) — A jury said Thursday that it has reached a decision on whether to recommend that Florida school shooter Nikolas Cruz be executed for the 2018 massacre that killed 17 people at Parkland’s Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School.

The recommendation was not immediately released and came in the second day of deliberations, 15 minutes after jurors arrived and examined the gun Cruz used.

The decision promises an end to a three-month trial that included graphic videos, photos and testimony from the massacre and its aftermath, heart-wrenching testimony from victims’ family members and a tour of the still blood-spattered building.

The jury’s decision must be unanimous if it intends to recommend the death penalty, and if that happens, it will be up to Circuit Judge Elizabeth Scherer to make a final decision. If all jurors can’t agree on recommending death, then Cruz would get life in prison.

The jury of 12 people had asked late Wednesday to see the AR-15-style semi-automatic rifle, but the Broward County Sheriff's Office security team objected, even though the gun has been made inoperable and Cruz's ammunition would be removed from the jury room.

Lead prosecutor Mike Satz, who has more the five decades of experience, pointed out that in every murder case he has tried or knows, jurors got to examine and handle the weapon in their room — and he said a knife or machete is more dangerous than a gun without a firing pin. Security has never been an issue, he said.

Cruz's attorneys had no objection to jurors seeing the gun.

Cruz, 24, pleaded guilty a year ago to murdering 14 students and three staff members and wounding 17 others on Feb. 14, 2018. Cruz said he chose Valentine's Day to make it impossible for Stoneman Douglas students to celebrate the holiday ever again. The jury will determine only if Cruz is sentenced to death or life without parole. For Cruz to get a death sentence, the jury must be unanimous.

During the prosecution's rebuttal case, Satz and his team argued that Cruz's smooth movements with the gun and his ease in reloading helps show he does not have any neurological disorders, as claimed by his attorneys.

Lead defense attorney Melisa McNeill and her team have never disputed that Cruz committed a horrible crime, but they say his birth mother's excessive drinking during pregnancy left him with fetal alcohol spectrum disorder and put him on a path that led to the shooting.

The massacre is the deadliest mass shooting that has ever gone to trial in the U.S. Nine other people in the U.S. who fatally shot at least 17 people died during or immediately after their attacks by suicide or police gunfire. The suspect in the 2019 massacre of 23 at an El Paso, Texas, Walmart is awaiting trial.

As reported by Terry Spencer on Oct 13th, 2022

Los Angeles Councilwoman Nury Martinez resigns following her leaked racist remarks.

LOS ANGELES, CA - Embattled Los Angeles City Councilwoman Nury Martinez has resigned, days after a recording of her making racist comments against the city's Black and Oaxacan communities was leaked.

"It is with a broken heart that I resign my seat for Council District 6, the community I grew up in and my home," she said in a statement.
The recorded conversation involving Council-members Martinez, Gil Cedillo and Kevin de León captured the now-former councilwoman describing the Black son of a white council-member in crude and racist language. She also described Oaxacan immigrants in Koreatown as "short little dark people."

The resignation comes hours after protesters disrupted a scheduled Wednesday city council meeting inside Los Angeles City Hall. With no resignation, there would be no meeting, they said in chants.

Prior to her resignation, Martinez had stepped down as president of the council, but stopped short of leaving the council altogether. Cedillo and de León have issued apologies, but haven't resigned.

Council-member Mike Bonin, whose son was the subject of Martinez's comments, earlier in the day tweeted a call for the three to step down.
It's unlikely that just Martinez's resignation will satisfy the L.A. community.

Dozens of protesters inside the meeting room on Wednesday shouted over President Pro Tempore Mitch O'Farrell as he attempted to speak and call for order. The protesters held signs that demanded members resign and chanted for an hour, as the meeting sputtered along.

O'Farrell attempted to order the group to quiet down, but finally called the meeting to an end after losing a quorum before anything on the agenda was addressed.

As reported by: Jaclyn Diaz & Vanessa Romo for NPR News on September 13th, 2022