Category Archives: Florida

Florida closes in on six-week abortion ban while also allowing no-permit gun carry

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Abortion legislation needs to move through house before gaining DeSantis’s likely signature while gun-carry law enacted today

Florida took another step to the right on Monday when the state senate approved a bill to ban abortions after six weeks, a measure supported by Republican governor and expected presidential candidate Ron DeSantis – who on the same day signed into law a bill allowing the public to carry concealed guns without a permit.

The latest proposal to restrict reproductive rights must still be approved by the house in the state legislature before it reaches the governor’s desk. Florida currently prohibits abortions after 15 weeks.

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Florida reels after two children allegedly ‘die at hands of their caregivers’

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A two-year-old’s father has been arrested over his death and a grandmother charged with aggravated manslaughter

Florida is reeling after two separate cases in the state allegedly saw children die at the hands of their caregivers, according to authorities.

In St Petersburg, the body of a two-year-old boy was found Friday in an alligator’s mouth a day after his mother was discovered murdered, prompting his father’s arrest.

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Florida plastic surgeon charged with murder in case of vanished lawyer

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Steve Cozzi took a break and never returned – but blood and video pointed to Tomasz Kosowski, who was suing Cozzi’s clients

One day last week, Steve Cozzi, a south Florida attorney, got up from his desk to use the bathroom. He never came back to work and has not been seen since.

Police say he was apparently murdered during that bathroom break, by a plastic surgeon at the center of a lawsuit in which Cozzi represented the opposing side.

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Art, not pornography: Florence museum invites Florida parents to see the David

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Galleria dell’Accademia director issues invitation in wake of incident that forced principal to resign after parents’ complaints

The Florence museum which houses Michelangelo’s David has invited the board of a Florida Christian charter school to visit, after the school’s principal was forced to resign following parent complaints that pupils were shown an image of the nude sculpture in a class.

Hope Carrasquilla resigned as principal of the Tallahassee Classical school last week, after the school board told her to quit or be fired. Carrasquilla’s exit came after three parents complained about a lesson on David, with one parent claiming the 16th century Renaissance masterpiece was pornographic.

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Florida principal resigns after parents decry Michelangelo’s David as pornography

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Tallahassee Classical school’s governing board heard complaints after sixth-graders were shown classical sculpture

A Florida principal has resigned after students at a Christian charter school in Tallahassee were shown the statue of the biblical figure David by Michelangelo, prompting at least one parent to complain that the children had been exposed to pornography.

Hope Carrasquilla resigned Monday as principal of the Tallahassee Classical school after the campus’s governing board told her to either step down or be fired over parental complaints that came in after sixth-grade students were shown the 16th-century sculpture, one of the Renaissance’s most famous pieces of art.

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Knock, knock, who’s there? Alligator bites Florida man after he opens door

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Scot Hollingsworth of Daytona Beach said he heard a noise and after opening door was bitten by 9ft alligator on the thigh

A Florida man answering a knock at his front door was promptly bitten by a 9ft long alligator when he opened it to see who was there.

Scot Hollingsworth, of Daytona Beach, told local TV station WKMG that he was watching TV with his wife when he heard a bump at the door and got up to investigate.

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Family of Florida man who died while being violently restrained sues jail staff

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Suit alleges that Broward county sheriff’s office used excessive force as Kevin Desir suffered mental health emergency in 2021

The family of a Florida man who died after being violently restrained by jailers is filing a civil rights suit against the officers who were involved in the incident and the jail’s healthcare provider.

According to a draft of the lawsuit shared exclusively with the Guardian, the family of 43-year-old Kevin Desir alleges that Broward county sheriff officials used excessive force against Desir while he was suffering from a severe mental health episode, violating his 14th amendment rights.

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Florida surgeon general’s Covid vaccine claims harm public, health agencies say

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‘Fueling vaccine hesitancy undermines effort’ to protect lives, warns letter to Dr Joseph Ladapo sent by FDA and CDC

US health agencies have sent a letter to the surgeon general of Florida, warning that his claims about Covid-19 vaccine risks are harmful to the public.

The letter was sent to Joseph Ladapo on Friday by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). It was a response to a letter Ladapo wrote to the agencies last month, expressing concerns about what he described as adverse effects from Covid vaccines.

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FBI searches for two Capitol attack defendants who have gone missing

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Joseph Hutchinson and Olivia Pollock, whose brother is also a January 6 defendant, had ankle monitors that were removed or altered

The FBI is searching for a Florida woman who was supposed to stand trial on Monday on charges stemming from the January 6 Capitol attack as well as another riot defendant who has also gone missing, officials said.

A federal judge in Washington issued bench warrants for the arrest of Olivia Pollock and Joseph Hutchinson III last week after the court was notified that they had tampered with or removed the ankle monitors that track their location, said Joe Boland, a supervisory special agent with the FBI’s Lakeland, Florida, office.

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Florida Republicans seek new abortion restrictions amid broad rightwing push

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Proposals include restrictions on gender identification, diversity programs, press freedoms, and relax concealed weapons laws

Florida Republicans are planning a broad rightwing legislative push, including new restrictions on gender identification, diversity and equity programs, abortion and press freedoms, and further relaxation of concealed weapons laws and the ability of courts to impose death sentences.

The basket of proposed legislation comes five months after the state’s rightwing Republican governor Ron DeSantis won re-election by a decisive margin and the Republicans established a convincing majority in the state legislature.

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Florida court denies habeas corpus petition for fetus of jailed woman

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Although the case was decided on a technicality, a dissenting judge on panel said the court should have rejected the claim on its merits

A Florida appeals court denied an attorney’s attempt to have a woman released from jail ahead of trial by arguing that her fetus was being illegally detained without charge – but the attorney says he plans to continue the legal battle.

Florida’s third district court of appeal dismissed without prejudice a petition for a writ of habeas corpus filed by attorney William M Norris on behalf of the “unborn child” of Natalia Harrell.

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Ron DeSantis takes control of Disney’s governing district after ‘don’t say gay’ row

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Move comes after Florida governor lashed out at theme park’s protest of law restricting sexual orientation discussion in schools

The Republican governor of Florida, Ron DeSantis, has signed a bill that wrests control of Walt Disney World’s self-governing district, in a move seen as punishing the company for its opposition to his so-called “don’t say gay” law.

“Today the corporate kingdom finally comes to an end,” he said at the bill signing in Lake Buena Vista in his trademark bullish style. “There’s a new sheriff in town, and accountability will be the order of the day.”

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Photographer describes Florida ordeal that killed journalist: ‘He kept shooting’

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Jesse Walden and his colleague Dylan Lyons were reporting on shooting allegedly by same attacker when Lyons was killed

In interviews from his hospital room, a wounded news photographer has described surviving the harrowing shooting on Wednesday that killed his fellow Florida journalist while they reported on an earlier shooting allegedly committed by the same attacker.

The photographer, Jesse Walden, said that he and his colleague Dylan Lyons had just arrived at a street in the Pine Hills neighborhood of Orlando where a local woman, Nathacha Augustin, had been murdered earlier the same day.

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Proposed Florida bill bans dogs from sticking their heads out car windows

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Lauren Book, Democratic leader in state senate who proposed the restriction, later said she would consider amending it

A Florida lawmaker says she is open to changing a bill that got people barking because it would ban dogs from sticking their heads out of a car window.

Lauren Book, the Democratic leader in the Florida senate, proposed the restriction in a bill, SB 932, filed last week. The measure would have made it illegal to “allow a dog to extend its head or any other body part outside a motor vehicle window while the person is operating the motor vehicle on a public roadway”.

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Journalist and child killed near scene of fatal Florida shooting earlier in day

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Police say man involved in earlier killing returned to scene and fired on news van before walking to nearby home and shooting girl

A central Florida television journalist and a young girl were fatally shot on Wednesday afternoon near the scene of a fatal shooting from earlier in the day, authorities said.

The Orange county sheriff, John Mina, said during a news conference on Wednesday evening that the police had detained Keith Melvin Moses, 19, who they believe is responsible for both shootings in the Orlando-area neighborhood.

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Florida researchers capture invasive pythons by attaching GPS collars to prey

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Burmese pythons, which can grow up to 20ft, have surged in south Florida due to snake owners releasing them when they get too big

To better find, capture and remove invasive Burmese pythons in Florida’s Everglades, a team of researchers is attaching location-tracking collars on animals such as raccoons and opossums that the predatory snakes feed on.

Burmese pythons have surged in south Florida in recent years, because many snake owners release them into the wild after they become too large to take care of.

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Florida couple unable to get abortion will see baby die after delivery

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Doctors’ interpretation of state law prevents procedure, family tells Washington Post, despite baby’s fatal illness

In a few weeks, a Florida couple will have to bid farewell to their child shortly after the baby is delivered, a gut-wrenching reality created by the US supreme court’s elimination of nationwide abortion rights last year.

Because of a new Florida law that bans abortion after 15 weeks except under certain circumstances, Deborah Dorbert has become one of many women having difficulty accessing necessary abortion procedures after the supreme court overturned the rights granted by the landmark 1973 Roe v Wade decision.

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DeSantis wins new power over Disney World in ‘don’t say gay’ culture war

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Florida legislature gives governor right to name members of board supervising theme park, claiming: ‘There’s a new sheriff in town’

Florida’s far-right governor, Ron DeSantis, has won the power to appoint the members of the board that supervises the development of the state’s famous Walt Disney World theme parks after a fight over a law that restricts sexual orientation and gender identity discussions in schools.

Disney as a result is set to lose some of the autonomy it has enjoyed in Florida during the last nearly six decades, but the company has held on to some of its key privileges amid the culture war leveled at it by DeSantis.

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Florida still world’s shark bite capital – but attacks on humans lowest in decade

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Across the world there were 57 unprovoked shark bites in 2022, most of which occurred in the US and Australia

Florida has retained its title as the shark bite capital of the world, according to new figures, but globally the number of such attacks on humans is at its joint lowest level for a decade.

Across the world there were 57 unprovoked shark bites in 2022, most of which occurred in the United States and Australia, said the University of Florida’s international shark attack file, a renowned resource that published its annual data on Monday.

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Ron DeSantis prepares for 2024 White House bid as Trump hits campaign trail

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Moves spur Trump into attacking Florida governor during low key events over the weekend in Iowa and New Hampshire

America’s 2024 presidential race is showing signs of kicking into gear amid reports that Florida’s rightwing Republican governor Ron DeSantis is now laying the groundwork for a White House bid as Donald Trump finally hit the campaign trail.

DeSantis’s moves even spurred Trump into attacking him directly as the former US president held relatively low key events over the weekend in the key early voting states of New Hampshire and South Carolina.

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