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Witness accounts, differ from deputy's

The state says it will not prosecute the man who was arrested by an off-duty deputy after the two got into an argument in Tarpon Springs.

By STEVE THOMPSON
Published September 2, 2005

Cpl. James Jeffrey Fresh said the man grabbed him by the throat.

That's why he had to arrest the man, Fresh said, though he was off duty that evening, April 16, and had drunk a few beers. But a month later, Fresh's "grabbed me by the throat" became more like "felt something" on my shoulder.

And even this version of events wasn't corroborated by any of the witnesses, including his wife, who was in the car with him when it happened.

The Pinellas-Pasco State Attorney's Office notified Fresh last month they would not prosecute Robert Singleton, the 58-year-old Holiday man he arrested. Records released this week reveal a case that was anything but solid.

Fresh, 36, arrested Singleton on charges of battery, a misdemeanor, and burglary, a felony. Inside Snookers Grill in Tarpon Springs, the pair had gotten into an argument about Fresh's treatment of a waitress. Outside, Fresh accused Singleton of reaching into his black convertible 2005 BMW to grab him by the neck. The burglary charge stemmed from the allegation that Singleton reached into the car.

Fresh, who had not identified himself as a deputy during the argument, grabbed his badge from the trunk of his BMW, ran across the parking lot after Singleton and yelled for someone to call 911. Tarpon Springs police arrived. They then turned the case over to the Sheriff's Office because, they said, it was Fresh's arrest.

This summer, the State Attorney's Office interviewed Fresh, who described the moment he says Singleton attacked him. A prosecutor took notes: "He felt something on his shoulder. It was the defendant (Singleton) who reached in and was apparently poking him trying to confront him."

Fresh's wife, Danielle Fresh, also was interviewed. She saw the two men arguing, she said, but did not see Singleton touch her husband. She had turned around to check on their young son, she said, who was in the back seat.

A prosecutor also interviewed Singleton's wife, Vickie Singleton. A report notes she appeared "very credible," having been a Pinellas County schoolteacher for 29 years.

She said her husband approached Fresh's BMW after Fresh yelled something like, "Go home old man. You just have to go back to your retirement home. You probably live in a trailer. You probably make only $30,000. I make a lot of money. That's why I drive this nice car."

Her view of the scuffle, she said, was blocked by a van. But afterward, she was walking beside her husband when Fresh came running up behind them. "Get on the ground, a------," she said he yelled. "Your a-- is going to jail."

She felt better when Tarpon Springs police arrived, though they put her husband in the back of a patrol car. She said an officer told her: "Don't worry. Your husband is not going anywhere. This is ridiculous. We are just kind of letting everything cool down."

But then, when sheriff's deputies took over, she got worried and asked them, "Aren't you going to ask my husband's side of the case?" She said she was told that if she didn't shut up, she might go to jail, too.

Later that night, while her husband sat in jail, she went back to the restaurant to find out if there was surveillance video of the parking lot. There was. However, sheriff's officials investigating the burglary had not collected it.

The investigators did photograph a scratch on Fresh's left shin. In the prosecutors' file, there's a picture of him standing in shorts and Nike tennis shoes, leg forward. There's also a closeup of the scratch, posed next to a ruler. It measures about a half-inch long. No apparent blood.

The scratch was important, part of the alleged battery. Fresh's report: "I was struggling and got Singleton's arm off me, but as I exited the car he slammed the door into my leg injuring my left shin."

That evening, sheriff's investigators didn't find any witnesses to support the claim. Tarpon Springs police interviewed a few people who described the overall argument, but no one had seen the actual physical confrontation.

But after a St. Petersburg Times article detailed the arrest, sheriff's investigators talked again with bystanders.

They spoke with Chris Lanni, 29, of Holiday, who had been sitting in the tiki bar overlooking the parking lot. "Christopher stated the driver stopped and opened the car door into the older man," a report says.

An investigator also talked with Fresh's wife. She said "her husband pushed the door open into the man . . . ," a report says.

Investigators also went back for the security video, which, the Times had reported, skips seconds ahead, omitting the physical confrontation between the two men.

A sheriff's sergeant spent hours trying to view the video, which required special software, trying to see if the omission was due to an erasure or a technical glitch. Sheriff's reports are not clear as to what he concluded. He turned his efforts over to a detective in the sheriff's Electronic Support Unit, his report says.

The night of the incident, Singleton went to jail on $10,250 bail. To that point, the retiree had no arrest record in Florida, where he has lived nearly his entire life.

Singleton paid a bondsman $1,100 for his release, money he will not get back. He also paid his attorney $2,800 to defend him. He now plans a lawsuit.

After the episode was detailed in the Times, the Sheriff's Office launched an internal investigation into Fresh's actions. That investigation continues.

Steve Thompson can be reached at 727-869-6245 or sthompson@sptimes.com

[Last modified September 2, 2005, 02:15:35]