 |
||
 |
||
 |
||
|
Home
Tampa Bay columnists Mary Jo Melone Howard Troxler News Sections Action Arts & Entertainment Business Citrus County Columnists Floridian Hernando County Obituaries Opinion Pasco County State Tampa Bay World & Nation Featured areas AP The Wire Alive! Area Guide Auto Classifieds Comics & Games Employment Health Forums Lottery Movies Police Report Real Estate Sports Stocks Weather What's New Wheelfinder Weekly Sections Home & Garden Perspective Taste Tech Times Travel Weekend Other Sections Buccaneers College Football Devil Rays Lightning Ongoing Stories Photo Reprints Photo Review Seniority Web Specials Ybor City
Market Info Advertise with the Times Contact Us All Departments
|
 |
Woman obtains restraining orderBy CURTIS KRUEGER © St. Petersburg Times, published April 29, 2000 A Pinellas County woman who had been frustrated in getting a restraining order against the ex-husband who tried to molest their daughter said she is relieved that an order has been issued. "I don't have to worry about my daughter riding her bike anymore," Phyllis Cole said. She said the news was "like 100 pounds that has been lifted from me." Cole appeared in court this week to seek the restraining order. Her ex-husband, Edward Lawrence Cole, also appeared in court and had no objection. Pinellas-Pasco Circuit Judge Walt Logan signed the order Friday. The order prohibits Edward Cole from coming to the general area around his ex-wife's house or to his daughter's school. He could not be reached for comment. Cole was arrested in 1992 and later pleaded no contest to attempted sexual battery on his daughter, who was 4 at the time. He spent about seven months in jail and nearly six years in the state prison system. He also was ordered to spend 15 years on probation after his prison term. When released from prison in 1998, Phyllis Cole asked a court to prevent Edward Cole from coming around her or her children as a condition of his probation. A judge initially granted her request, but Edward Cole appealed and the decision was overturned. She later went to court seeking a restraining order against him, but lost. A story about her inability to get the protection appeared in the St. Petersburg Times last month. This time, Phyllis Cole enlisted the help of Gulfcoast Legal Services and went to court again seeking a restraining order. Her new petition stressed that she thought her ex-husband had driven by her house. Edward Cole has vigorously denied that and the court's action does not address the allegation. Denise Springer, staff attorney for Gulfcoast, said she argued that the crime Edward Cole committed was an act of domestic violence, "and also that there was no other correct legal vehicle that could afford her the protection that she needs."
 © St. Petersburg Times. All rights reserved. 
|
|
|
