Documents show that investigators removed an answering machine from Jennifer Porter's home along with other evidence.
By BRADY DENNIS and SAUNDRA AMRHEIN
Published April 14, 2004
Shortly after a hit-and-run crash on N 22nd Street that left two children dead, Jennifer Porter called her Land O'Lakes home from her cell phone, according to records released Tuesday.
Suspecting that Porter may have made "statements about the crash" on a telephone answering machine at the home she shares with her family, investigators confiscated an answering machine and 51 numbers from a caller ID box in a search of the home April 7, according to investigative documents.
The documents also show that two days after the March 31 crash, Porter's attorney Barry Cohen escorted Hillsborough Sheriff's investigators to a Toyota Echo in the Porters' driveway. Damage to the car, including on the windshield and driver's door, appeared consistent with debris found at the scene of the crash.
Deputies also found human hair and human tissue on the car's shattered windshield, as well as blood on the undercarriage, a search warrant stated.
Porter's lawyer has said she was the driver of the Toyota Echo that authorities believe was involved in the March 31 collision. But not until Tuesday, when documents from the search warrant became public, have details of her involvement come to light.
A day after asking a Pasco County judge for the warrant, investigators confiscated the telephone equipment from a bedroom in the home where the 28-year-old elementary school dance teacher lived. Authorities said the cell phone used to make the call after the wreck came from the same number Porter gave to the school district as a contact number.
The warrant, approved by Pasco-Pinellas Circuit Judge Lynn Tepper on April 6, also said a co-worker reported seeing Porter drive the Toyota Echo away from work at Muller Elementary School about 7:05 p.m. on March 31. The crash happened several blocks away at 7:11 p.m., officials said.
With the warrant, investigators collected nearly 20 items, according to an inventory document. Among them: a trash can with a steering wheel cover inside, dryer lint from the laundry room, seat covers found in a hallway and a vacuum.
They also gathered pieces of glass from the laundry room, a carpeted bedroom, the family room floor, the garage floor and the hearth, as well as paint chips from some of the same places, according to the inventory.
The March 31 crash killed Bryant Wilkins, 13, and his 3-year-old brother Durontae Caldwell. Two of their siblings, 2-year-old LaJuan Davis and 8-year-year Aquina Wilkins, were hospitalized but later released.
Two weeks after the accident, Porter hasn't spoken with investigators. At an April 5 press conference in which Porter issued an apology, Cohen said his client wasn't ready to meet with them yet "because she's been through a trauma that no one can imagine and she's having to deal with some really tough issues."
In other developments in the case this week, Cohen continued his public relations efforts on her behalf with a full-page advertisement in the April 9 edition of the Florida Sentinel-Bulletin, Tampa's black newspaper, titled, "An Open Letter to the African American Community."
In the ad, Cohen says he is writing the letter out of "respect and concern for the feelings of the African American community" after the boys' deaths.
Cohen says he has received hostile messages aimed at his client and himself. He rebuffs suggestions that race is affecting Porter's treatment.
The high-profile Tampa lawyer outlines his own sensitivity to black Americans' civil rights - including his prosecution of a Ku Klux Klan grand dragon, his letter to Sen. Trent Lott blasting him for racist comments and a copy of last year's law firm holiday card quoting Martin Luther King Jr.
He urges the public to be patient during a full investigation by the Sheriff's Office and promises, "if they don't, we will hold them accountable as we have done in the past."
He urges the drivers of a white van and a Honda - "who closed their lights and sped away from the scene" - to show the same "courage" Porter did and come forward.
Initially investigators thought a car, possibly a Honda, and a white van were involved in the hit and run. Then, evidence at the scene indicated a Toyota Echo had been in the crash. Now investigators say the occupants of the van were likely witnesses, and there may not have been a Honda.
Witnesses at the scene said a driver going northbound turned off the car's lights after dragging Durontae more than 100 feet and then sped away.
Michelle Patty, a well-known activist in the black community and a friend of the children's family, said Tuesday she had one question about the placement of Cohen's ad: "Why?"
"We're not questioning who he is and what he's done," she said. "It's not about him. It's about the person or persons who hit and killed these children."
She agreed on the need for a fair and thorough investigation.
"We hope he's not trying to taint witnesses that read that newspaper," she said.
- Times staff writers Chase Squires and David Karp contributed to this report.
