BARTOW - A jury on Thursday convicted a man for the vigilante-style killing of a neighbor he mistakenly thought tried to abduct his son.
James Alton Price, 49, was convicted of first-degree murder in the shooting death of Kenneth Lee Stephenson, 31, on Sept. 16, 2000. Price faces the possibility of a death sentence.
Price drove around his Dawn Heights neighborhood looking for a man in a red car after his 10-year-old son told him such a person tried to pick him up at a school bus stop. Price saw Stephenson driving his red car home from work at night, followed him and wound up emptying his .357-caliber Magnum at Stephenson after Stephenson confronted him.
It later came out that Price's son lied to his father. The man in the red car stopped only to rebuke the boy for taunting him through the school bus windows as he was stopped behind the vehicle. Stephenson was not that man.
Byrd wants voters to revisit class size
TALLAHASSEE - House Speaker Johnnie Byrd supports asking voters to reduce the scope of the class size amendment they approved last year in exchange for a legislative commitment to improve teacher training, recruitment and salaries.
Byrd's measure would reduce the state's obligation to lower class sizes for all grades to just kindergarten through third grade.
"We all know that accountability and teacher quality are much more an important factor in education than class size," Byrd, R-Plant City, said Thursday. "So we're going to ask the people of Florida to make a deal with us that, as an intermediate step, they could reduce the class size from K-12 to K-3 and in return we're going to make a commitment to enhance teacher quality."
Last year, voters approved the constitutional amendment that mandates capping the number of students in public school classrooms to 18 in prekindergarten through third grade, 22 in fourth through eighth grades and 25 in high school by 2010.
The state Board of Education and Gov. Jeb Bush have gone on record as supporting repeal of the amendment, citing its nearly $1-billion cost in the first two years.
Damien Filer, a spokesman for the Florida Coalition to Reduce Class Size, called Byrd's proposal "despicable," saying lawmakers should concentrate on following voters' instructions.
IMC Phosphates penalized for misplaced fill material
IMC Phosphates Co. has agreed to restore a 139-acre tract at an estimated cost of $350,000 and pay a penalty of $50,000 to settle a federal complaint.
IMC illegally discharged fill material beyond boundaries set by Army Corps of Engineers permits authorizing the placement of fill material in wetland areas at four phosphate mines in Hillsborough, Polk and Hardee counties, according to an announcement by the U.S. attorney for the Middle District of Florida. The illegal fills affected a total of 11.3 acres of wetlands and 24.6 acres of open water.
In addition, IMC is to preserve and maintain 167.5 acres of the restored wetlands and will monitor to ensure the successful restoration of the remaining 7.4 acres affected by the settlement.
Diana Youmans, public relations manager for IMC, said Wednesday "the incidents were self-reported. ... We fully cooperated with them on the investigation and on planning the mitigation."
