A woman says a neighbor drove his truck into her mobile home - twice - after a fight with his girlfriend.
By DUANE BOURNE
Published May 31, 2003
SPRING HILL - Jacinda Puig pointed to where her porch used to be.
A gaping hole exposed shattered support beams, cracked wood and insulation from her mobile home at the end of Carlton Street, just west of the Suncoast Parkway.
"I don't know what I am going to do," she said.
Shortly before midnight Thursday, her neighbor, Billy E. Birchfield, 46, of 1067 Carlton St., rammed his 1994 Dodge Dakota truck into Puig's home after his live-in girlfriend, Tammy Dennison, sought refuge there, according to authorities. Birchfield, a sheriff's report stated, had grabbed his girlfriend by the throat.
Drunk and enraged, Birchfield began screaming for Dennison to come out of Puig's house, Puig said Friday.
She did not.
Then, Birchfield aimed his Dakota truck - with "Asylum Bound" scrolled across the windshield - toward the mobile home and "gunned it," said Puig.
Birchfield crashed into the house. He set the truck in reverse, and hit the home again, said Puig.
Birchfield was arrested at his home across the limerock road and charged with two counts of battery, two counts of criminal mischief, two counts of aggravated assault, grand theft, driving under the influence of alcohol and domestic battery.
He was being held Friday at the Hernando County Jail in lieu of $21,000 bail.
Meanwhile, Puig, her husband and two sons were left homeless.
Her sons, ages 16 and 17, were spending time at a friend's house. But Puig knows that cannot last forever.
County code enforcement officers told her that the home was uninhabitable - that someone would get hurt if the family stayed.
Puig said she and her husband cannot afford to move.
"I have nowhere to go," she said.
- Duane Bourne covers law enforcement and emergency services in Hernando County and can be reached at 754-6114. Send e-mail to dbourne@sptimes.com
