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Tampa Bay briefs

News of note.

By TIMES STAFF WRITER
Published October 7, 2006

Truck crash, fire snarls Frankland rush-hour traffic

TAMPA - Diesel fuel from a jackknifed truck caught fire Friday afternoon on Interstate 275, backing up traffic from the Howard Frankland Bridge for miles.

At 2:55 p.m., 48-year-old Ramon Gonzalez was driving his flatbed semitrailer truck past the Tampa International Airport exit when he came upon stopped traffic and swerved into the median to avoid it, said Florida Highway Patrol spokesman Larry Coggins.

The skidding truck crashed into a concrete barrier wall and light pole, which fell across both southbound lanes, he said. A diesel tank ruptured and the fuel was set ablaze by sparks from the accident. No one was hurt.

Officers closed the highway in both directions while firefighters put out the flames, removed the light pole and moved the truck onto a flatbed. By 4 p.m., all lanes had reopened, but by 5 p.m. traffic was still backed up on the bridge.

"Our biggest problem was people slowing down to look," Coggins said.

The exit from I-275 northbound to Cypress Street and the airport remained closed for several hours.

Gonzalez was charged with careless driving, Coggins said.

St. Petersburg police investigate bank robbery

ST. PETERSBURG - Police are searching for a man who robbed a Mercantile Bank at 425 22nd Ave. N Thursday morning while armed with a handgun.

Police say the man, who appeared to be in his 20s, pulled a handgun out of a brown paper bag after approaching a teller and demanded money. He then left the bank with an undisclosed amount of cash, apparently in a forest green van, police said.

Police have released surveillance photographs of the robber and have asked anyone with information to call 893-7266.

Man sentenced to prison for drunken-driving death

LARGO - A St. Petersburg man was sentenced to 22 years in prison Friday for an alcohol-related crash in July 2005 that killed a woman in Pasadena.

Michael L. Henderson, 40, was eligible for up to 30 years in prison because he has a lengthy criminal record. But the family of the woman who died, Joann Ettell, agreed to let him plead guilty to a driving under the influence-manslaughter charge and receive a 22-year sentence, said prosecutor Scott Rosenwasser.

He said the family didn't want to endure a trial nor the chance that a jury would find Henderson not guilty.

"They were very happy with the 22 years," Rosenwasser said.

Ettell was turning left from Sun Island Drive onto Pasadena Avenue about 10 p.m. on July 23, 2005, when she was struck by a 1983 Ford driven by Henderson.

An investigation showed Henderson, who had a blood-alcohol count about twice the state's legal limit, was driving at least 55 mph in a 35 mph zone.

The impact sent Ettell's car spinning, and she was thrown from the car and landed in the median.

Deal means prison for man who killed his roommate

LARGO - A St. Petersburg man was sentenced to 15 years in prison Wednesday for killing his roommate.

Adrian C. Guzman, 24, pleaded no contest to a manslaughter charge, which prosecutors downgraded from second-degree murder.

St. Petersburg police said Guzman attacked his roommate, Leonard Norton, in August during an argument over a car. Guzman hit Norton in the head with a pipe, police said.

Norton died at the hospital two days later.

Authorities arrest four in home-invasion robberies

ST. PETERSBURG - Police and federal agents arrested four people Thursday who they say are connected to a series of home-invasion robberies.

John Ryan, an assistant special agent in charge of the Tampa office of the federal Bureau of Alcohol Tobacco and Firearms, declined to release the names of the people arrested because the investigation was still under way.

Ryan said federal agents worked with St. Petersburg police, and recovered firearms after making the arrests near a Safeguard Self Storage at 2501 22nd Ave. N.

[Last modified October 7, 2006, 05:59:58]