These guys need a good lawyer, Ally McBeal perhaps?

By Times staff writers

© St. Petersburg Times, published May 26, 2000

[Times photo: Ken Helle] Publix identification stickers on food found in The Price is Right store identified it as merchandise that was to be donated to the Divine Providence Food Bank in Tampa.

News item:

State officials say three men took $2.5-million worth of food donated to the poor by Publix and sold it for profit in a scratch-and-dent store.

Instead of bringing the food to Divine Providence Food Bank in Tampa, truck driver Ramon Antonio Martinez turned it over to accomplices who sold it in one of Tampa's poorest neighborhoods.

"We're trying to help people here," said Sherryl Herbert, executive director of Divine Providence. "They didn't steal from us, they were stealing from hungry people, less fortunate people, people who were having problems."

The defendants -- Martinez, Gary W. Nash and Robert A. Faedo -- might find it difficult to explain themselves to a jury. In the spirit of charity, we suggest the following legal defenses.

• Entrapment. Publix filled our truck with food, asking nothing in return, and sent us on our way. It's not like we asked for it.
• Economic imperative. In a capitalist society, it would be a crime NOT to seize an opportunity for profit.
• Police misconduct. We were framed. Florida Department of Law Enforcement agents smuggled cans of food into the scratch-and-dent store and posed as shoppers to buy them. Then they bought expensive things using our names to make us look like criminals.
• Mistaken identity. We didn't do it. O.J. did.
• Naivete (for use only by Faedo, 29). The other guys are in their 50s. I am just a little child who was exploited by two older men. Just like Valessa Robinson.
• Incompetence. We got lost on the way to Divine Providence and we were afraid the food would spoil so we sold it. We tried to go back to Publix to return the money but got lost again.
• Civic mindedness. We were doing our part to break the cycle of poverty by delivering the hungry from a lifetime of dependence.
• Nutritional concerns. It was mostly junk food anyway; we were doing the poor a favor.
• Safety concerns. We wanted to check the Cracker Jack boxes for faulty prizes.
• Insanity. The voice of the Kash n' Karry guy told us to do it.

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