Verdict triggers strong reactions

From protesters to defenders, the boot camp acquittals stir up emotions, especially for residents of Bay County.

By ABBIE VANSICKLE, Times Staff Writer
Published October 14, 2007

PANAMA CITY -- One legislator threatened an economic boycott. Another called the verdict a look backward to segregation. The Department of Justice has already opened a civil rights investigation.

In his Panama City wine shop, Clay Avedisian summed up some local feelings about the ruckus: "sour grapes."

Avedisian, 52, owner of the Wine Dog, said Saturday that it's time everyone accepted Friday's verdict and stopped criticizing Bay County.

The day after a jury found eight boot camp employees not guilty in the death of Martin Lee Anderson, many here felt the county was unfairly portrayed -- and continues to be misunderstood.

"Bay County's no different from any other county in Florida," Avedisian said.

The scrutiny began just after the 14-year-old's death in January 2006 at the Bay County Sheriff's Office Juvenile Boot Camp. National news programs showed grainy video of drill instructors roughing up the teenager as the camp's nurse watched, hands on hips.

Legislators criticized the county, implying deep-rooted racism, a drumbeat that escalated when a second autopsy ruled that the boy had died of suffocation and not, as the first examiner had said, of complications of a sickle cell trait, a blood disorder.

After a jury acquitted the seven guards and the nurse on charges of aggravated manslaughter of a child, student protesters marched in Tallahassee streets and state Rep. Frank Peterman, D-St. Petersburg, called for an economic boycott of Bay County by "people who believe in justice."

Avedisian, who came to Panama City from North Carolina, said that perception of his town is untrue. "I've been here two years," he said. "From what I see it's a great town."

A few miles away, in the famed spring break land of Panama City Beach, shop owners think tourists will come, boycott or not.

The beach, a maze of mini-golf courses, high-rise hotels and seafood restaurants, is nationally known for its white sugar sand.

"Why would they want to boycott Bay County?" said Joey DiMeglio, 37, as he prepared pizzas Saturday in his shop on Panama City Beach. "The verdict is politics, not business."

Transplants from New York, DiMeglio and his wife say they -- and the majority of others in Bay County -- are no different from most other Americans. Their lives are hectic. They're raising kids and keeping a small business afloat. They didn't kill Martin Lee Anderson. Why can't everyone get that?

"I don't understand why they want to hurt Bay County economically," DiMeglio said. "We weren't involved. Why is it our fault?"

"If we could have done something about it, we would have," added wife Ann Marie DiMeglio, 39.

Down the street, at the Beach Bicycle Shop, Everett Lukas, 43, peered up from fixing a tire. Lukas felt that officials did Bay County a disservice by their actions in the case, but he didn't believe a boycott was the answer.

"There are many cases, many places, where the community is outraged, one way or the other," Lukas said. "That's like putting a double wrong on top of it."

Not that he thought it would work: "How many people are going to boycott Bay County? Tourists are not going to stop coming here."

Drive to the other side of town, near the home where Anderson was raised. At Big Jr.'s House of Soul on Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard, the talk takes on a different tenor.

Restaurant owner Naji Khalid Sayeed, 38, watched the verdict on television. It was frustrating to see the jury return in just two hours, and it was made especially painful because he has a 16-year-old son who knew Anderson. As a racial minority in Panama City, he said he views life here with a different perspective.

"It is truly the Redneck Riviera," he said. "If white folk have a different perspective on justice than we do, they look at the justice system with trust, with adulation and respect. We look at it with mistrust."

A couple of blocks away, it was business as usual at City Commissioner Jonathan Wilson's barbershop. The benches were filled with people waiting for a trim.

Wilson, the city's only black commissioner, says the verdict stunned him but he still has faith in Bay County -- and justice.

"I don't advocate a boycott," Wilson said. "The best way is to write your legislators."

Months before the trial, local conservative radio host Burnie Thompson took to the airwaves. He told Bay County's residents that evidence aligned with Bay County's medical examiner. He said the teen died of a medical condition, not a beating. His show had such local influence that attorneys asked potential jurors if they had listened.

The day after the verdict, Thompson's tone was of reconciliation, of peace. He wanted to help the community heal.

"I've been in a lot of places," he said. "This is a more enlightened place than people think."

He wants people to be able to move on with their lives in peace, he said in a phone conversation.

He stopped a reporter's questions to answer one from his young daughter -- something about unicorns.

The two were in the middle of a walk, picking flowers and grasses and playing make believe on the cool afternoon.

Abbie VanSickle can be reached at vansickle@sptimes.com or (813) 226-3373.

[Last modified October 14, 2007, 01:24:39]