FL – Mayor Dale Massad attempted murder LEs, practice medicine w/o license, Port Richey, 21 FEB 2019

[SeesSeas]

Former Port Richey mayor's defense team asks judge to withhold part of jailhouse phone call tape
June 20, 2019
NEW PORT RICHEY — Former Port Richey Mayor Dale Massad walked into the courtroom with a slight limp Thursday morning. His dark hair was combed back. He wore a charcoal colored suit and a light teal shirt, unlike the orange and white jumpsuit he wore while sitting in a wheelchair at his hearing last week.

Massad’s attorneys asked Pinellas-Pasco Circuit Court Judge Mary Handsel to consider striking portions of a recorded phone call Massad made from jail, evidence prosecutors plan to present during his upcoming trial on charges of obstruction of justice. He’s also charged with practicing medicine without a license and attempted murder.

Their request was partially granted, but not before Handsel questioned their reasons for some of the omissions.
[...]
The obstruction case is rolling out first because Massad’s attorneys requested his right to a speedy trial on that charge. Jury selection is set for Monday, and opening statements are set to begin on Tuesday. Attorneys waived Massad's right to a speedy trial on his other charges.
[...]
The judge ruled to keep the majority of the audio recording, except for mentions of the homicide-related charges and any mention of her. The jury for the obstruction case will be told only that Massad also is facing more serious charges that occurred during the warrant execution.
[...]

 

[SeesSeas]

Judge To Allow Parts of Phone Calls As Evidence In Massad Trial
UPDATED 1:29 PM ET Jun. 20, 2019
PORT RICHEY, Fla. — Jurors will be allowed to hear parts of two recordings during next week's trial for former Port Richey Mayor Dale Massad.
[...]
"I think what the judge called was appropriate," said Denis deVlaming, Massad's attorney. "We look forward to the trial next week. It’s going to be a short trial, and we expect that he’s going to be acquitted."
[...]
The trial, which starts Monday, is expected to last one or two days.

 

[SeesSeas]

Port Richey votes are in: Mayor Scott Tremblay will replace ex-mayor Dale Massad
June 18, 2019
Former Pasco County prosecutor Scott Tremblay is the new mayor of Port Richey, winning a tight special election to replace jailed ex-mayor Dale Massad.
[...]

 

[SeesSeas]

Of interest - regarding Pasco County Sheriff’s Office (same agency arrested Dale Massad)
“I have a case where the Pasco Sheriff's a criminal and ultimately should be removed," [Attorney] McGuire said. "It's the most corrupt county in the state."

Former K-9 officer joins lawsuit against Pasco County Sheriff’s Office, says supervisor threatened to kill his dog
June 21, 2019
A former Pasco County Sheriff’s Office K-9 deputy has joined the growing list of plaintiffs who filed a federal lawsuit against Sheriff Chris Nocco and several of his high-ranking commanders.

Former deputy Cliff Baltzer says his sergeant filed a false internal affairs complaint against him in 2018 and threatened to euthanize his canine partner and then go on social media and blame Baltzer for the dog’s death.

The lawsuit was first filed against top Pasco sheriff’s officials on April 16 by three plaintiffs. They alleged that Nocco and agency leaders are “intoxicated with power and will physically abuse, intimidate, incarcerate, extort, and defame in order to ensure their absolute control.”

Clearwater attorney John McGuire filed an amended suit on Wednesday, increasing the number of named plaintiffs to 21 former sheriff's employees, including Baltzer. The civil lawsuit makes a claim under the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act, often called RICO. The suit accuses high-ranking members of the department of gender discrimination, falsifying internal affairs complaints and targeting people who spoke against the department.
[...]
“I have a case where the Pasco Sheriff's a criminal and ultimately should be removed," McGuire said. "It's the most corrupt county in the state."
[...]
After Baltzer challenged the sergeant’s assertions, he said, the sergeant confronted him in a parking lot and said “I'll make sure I'll put your dog down and make sure you're blamed on social media."

Baltzer said he was demoted from the K-9 unit due to the complaint. He decided to buy Tundra, paid $8,500 to the Sheriff's Office, and was allowed to pick up the dog after he resigned, he said.
[...]

 

[SeesSeas]

Jury Selection Completed in Trial for Former Port Richey Mayor
PUBLISHED 7:40 AM EDT Jun. 24, 2019 UPDATED 5:22 PM ET Jun. 24, 2019
PORT RICHEY, Fla. — Attorneys selected a panel of six jurors and one alternate to hear the obstruction of justice case against former Port Richey mayor Dale Massad on Monday. The jurors were selected from an initial group of 50 people.

Dale Massad, 68, is facing multiple charges stemming from his Feb. 21 arrest. However, this trial is strictly for the obstruction charge, which stems from a jailhouse call between Massad and then-acting Mayor Terrance Rowe, who was arrested almost a month after Massad.
[...]

 

[SeesSeas]

Witness Testimony Starts in Ex-Mayor's Obstruction Trial
PUBLISHED 10:56 AM EDT Jun. 25, 2019
[...]
Circuit Judge Mary Handsel opened the proceedings by telling the jury Massad is charged with conspiracy to obstruct justice and use of a two-way communication device. She reminded them the burden is on prosecution to prove charges beyond a reasonable doubt.

During opening arguments, Massad's attorney Denis deVlaming told the jury they will hear no evidence that there was conspiracy to violate any law. He said the conversation included talk of dissolving the police department, which police officer listening to jail calls didn’t like.
[...]

 

[SeesSeas]

Ex-Mayor Massad Found Guilty on Conspiracy to Obstruct Charge
UPDATED 6:22 PM ET Jun. 25, 2019
PORT RICHEY, Fla. — Former Port Richey Mayor Dale Massad was found guilty Tuesday of conspiracy to obstruct justice.

The jury's verdict came at about 6 p.m. at the end of a one-day trial in which four witnesses testified. The jury took less than an hour to decide on the evidence.
[...]

 

[SeesSeas]

Ex-Port Richey mayor Dale Massad convicted of obstruction; more trials to come
June 25, 2019
[...]
This is just the start of Massad’s legal problems: He still faces trial on charges of attempted murder and practicing medicine without a license.
[...]
Massad will continue to be held in jail without bail, pending his next trials. However, Tuesday’s conviction could result in prison time.
[...]
The ex-mayor himself did not testify based upon the advice of his attorneys, he told Pinellas-Pasco Circuit Court Judge Mary Handsel. But he said he could have.

“I could testify,” Massad said. “I don’t understand it all very well, obviously, so I’m just going to take their advice.

“Everything about law is contrary to the way I think.”

 

[SeesSeas]

He’s out: The second mayor of Port Richey arrested in February has resigned
June 28, 2019
PORT RICHEY — The Port Richey City Council finally can take a breath. It shook off the last of its most recent political woes on Friday. Four months after his arrest, former Vice Mayor Terry Rowe resigned.

Rowe's resignation came three days after a jury found former Mayor Dale Massad guilty of obstruction of justice. Rowe is facing the same obstruction charge after he was on the receiving end of a February jailhouse phone call with Massad. Rowe’s pretrial conference is scheduled for July 18. While the two former mayors go through the justice system, the city's new mayor said he is ready to see the city get back to business.
[...]

 

[PayrollNerd]

Looks like they released some documents.

Year in review: Port Richey's mayoral saga threatened city's extinction

PORT RICHEY — Police officers went to the same Hayward Lane address more than 50 times over the three years Dale Massad served as mayor of this west Pasco city. But it was their final visit to the mayor’s home on Feb. 21 that thrust the city into the national spotlight after authorities accused Massad of shooting at SWAT deputies raiding his house.

A jury convicted Massad of those charges and Rowe is scheduled to face jurors in February. Massad, a former physician who surrendered his license in the 1990s, also is scheduled to go to trial in 2020 on charges of attempted murder of the law officers and practicing medicine without a license — the accusation that started a state investigation in 2018 and let to the raid at Massad’s house.

The release of Florida Department of Law Enforcement investigative documents took the public inside Massad’s sordid world. They included accounts of nightly crack smoking and regular use of crystal methamphetamine that the mayor called "jet fuel,'' witnesses told investigators. One man said Massad traded him the hormone testosterone for illegal drugs. Witnesses also said they watched the then-mayor suture injuries and perform other medical procedures in his kitchen.

 

[SeesSeas]

Looks like they released some documents.
Year in review: Port Richey's mayoral saga threatened city's extinction

The documents were released earlier this year. The article is a recap of the year -- "Year in review. . ."
Year in review: Port Richey’s mayoral saga threatened city’s extinction
Here is the APR 2019 post about the records released:

Ex-Port Richey mayor Dale Massad used crack cocaine and meth, new records show
April 11, 2019
PORT RICHEY — The mayor of this small coastal city spent years smoking crack cocaine on a nightly basis and used methamphetamine, too, according to court records obtained by the Tampa Bay Times.

Dale Massad paid runners to bring him illegal drugs, the records show, and acted as the personal doctor for his pals, suturing their injuries on his kitchen table — all while he held elected office.
[...]
Massad and his friends liked crystal methamphetamine — a concentrated form of meth — a man named Corey White told investigators on Sept. 27, records show. They called it “jet fuel.”

White said he had known Massad for years and lived in an apartment attached to the mayor's home from about Christmas 2017 to the end of April 2018, according to records. He told agents he had purchased drugs for Massad about 60 times.
[...]
He said he saw Massad smoke and eat meth, records show. Sometimes, Massad would crush the drug up, form a line of it on his counter and snort it before going out to golf, White told agents.

White said the mayor also smoked crack cocaine on a nightly basis while he lived with him, records show, and White told agents he also bought that drug for Massad, sometimes up to five nights a week.
[...]
Another man who said he had lived with Massad last year, Daniel Tatum, told investigators that the mayor would trade him the hormone testosterone for meth or marijuana, records show.
[...]

 

[SeesSeas]

Ex-Port Richey mayor files stand your ground motion in attempted murder case
February 5, 2020
NEW PORT RICHEY — Attorneys for Dale Massad will argue that the former Port Richey mayor, who faces five charges of attempted first-degree murder, is immune from prosecution under Florida’s stand your ground law.

They say Massad feared for his life and acted in self-defense when he fired two shots at Pasco County Sheriff’s deputies who had entered his home to serve a search warrant last year, according to a stand your ground motion filed Monday.

According to the motion, filed by defense attorneys Bjorn Brunvand and Denis deVlaming, Massad was asleep at 4:30 a.m. last Feb. 21, when deputies, including a SWAT team, arrived at the then-mayor’s waterfront Port Richey home.
[...]
Deputies knocked on Massad’s door several times and announced their presence, according to an arrest report, before using a battering ram and a shotgun on the front door and detonating a flash-bang just inside the house. But Massad’s attorneys argue that the mayor, sleeping behind a closed door with the fan on, couldn’t hear the knocking, and that deputies took “only seconds” between knocking and breaking the door open.

Massad, hearing the noise of the battering ram, awoke “believing that his home was being invaded by criminals,” according to the motion. He took a gun from his room, went into the hallway and fired two shots “in order to stop what he believed to be a home invasion” at about the same time deputies detonated the flash-bang.

One of Massad’s house guests also called 911 at the time to report what she believed to be a criminal break-in, according to the motion.

The attorneys also argue that it was unreasonable to execute the search warrant early in the morning, and that deputies should have come to the house during the day, when Massad was at his office.
[...]
Massad’s attempted murder trial is set to begin Feb. 24, and Brunvand said the defense still expects the trial to begin as scheduled. A pretrial hearing, where Brunvand said the motion will be addressed, has been set for Friday.
[...]

 

[PayrollNerd]

Ex-Port Richey mayor files stand your ground motion in attempted murder case
February 5, 2020
NEW PORT RICHEY — Attorneys for Dale Massad will argue that the former Port Richey mayor, who faces five charges of attempted first-degree murder, is immune from prosecution under Florida’s stand your ground law.

They say Massad feared for his life and acted in self-defense when he fired two shots at Pasco County Sheriff’s deputies who had entered his home to serve a search warrant last year, according to a stand your ground motion filed Monday.

According to the motion, filed by defense attorneys Bjorn Brunvand and Denis deVlaming, Massad was asleep at 4:30 a.m. last Feb. 21, when deputies, including a SWAT team, arrived at the then-mayor’s waterfront Port Richey home.
[...]
Deputies knocked on Massad’s door several times and announced their presence, according to an arrest report, before using a battering ram and a shotgun on the front door and detonating a flash-bang just inside the house. But Massad’s attorneys argue that the mayor, sleeping behind a closed door with the fan on, couldn’t hear the knocking, and that deputies took “only seconds” between knocking and breaking the door open.

Massad, hearing the noise of the battering ram, awoke “believing that his home was being invaded by criminals,” according to the motion. He took a gun from his room, went into the hallway and fired two shots “in order to stop what he believed to be a home invasion” at about the same time deputies detonated the flash-bang.

One of Massad’s house guests also called 911 at the time to report what she believed to be a criminal break-in, according to the motion.

The attorneys also argue that it was unreasonable to execute the search warrant early in the morning, and that deputies should have come to the house during the day, when Massad was at his office.
[...]
Massad’s attempted murder trial is set to begin Feb. 24, and Brunvand said the defense still expects the trial to begin as scheduled. A pretrial hearing, where Brunvand said the motion will be addressed, has been set for Friday.
[...]

What a twisted messed up nut this guy is. If a guest thought criminals were breaking in and called 911, it is possible they’ll get this charged lowered or dropped. I think its the sum total of all the charges that will do him in tho. Party's over Dude.

 

[SeesSeas]

Trial Feb 24
Ex-Port Richey mayor’s stand your ground claim will get ruling at end of trial
February 7, 2020
NEW PORT RICHEY — A judge’s decision on whether former Port Richey Mayor Dale Massad was standing his ground when he fired two shots as a SWAT team breached his front door last year will not happen in a pre-trial hearing typical of stand your ground cases.

Instead, Massad’s trial for five counts of first-degree attempted murder, set to begin Feb. 24, will continue as scheduled. Toward the end of the trial — after arguments and before the jury comes to a verdict — Judge Mary Handsel will determine whether Massad should be immune from prosecution.

The judge and attorneys on both sides came to that agreement during a pre-trial hearing Friday, four days after Massad’s attorneys filed a stand your ground motion.
[...]
In most stand your ground cases, a specific hearing is set for attorneys to present their cases to a judge. After a 2017 change in the law, prosecutors now have the burden of proving that stand your ground does not apply.

But in this case, both prosecutors and defense attorneys wanted the trial to go on as scheduled, they told Handsel. They considered setting a stand your ground hearing on Feb. 21, but prosecutors said they’d have to subpoena 20 witnesses already subpoenaed for the following week’s trial, and Handsel said media coverage of a stand your ground hearing could make jury selection difficult the following week.

They agreed to treat the stand your ground motion as a motion for a judgment of acquittal, where the defense, claiming that the prosecution doesn’t have sufficient evidence to convict, asks a judge to acquit before a jury’s decision.
[...]

 

[SeesSeas]

Ex-Port Richey Mayor Dale Massad’s stand your ground case could tread uncharted waters
Outline - Read & annotate without distractions
FEBRUARY 17, 2020
PORT RICHEY - A series of booms and blasts rang out at Dale Massad's waterfront home shortly before the then-mayor's arrest last February. They lasted 39 seconds.

At his door, Pasco County Sheriff&'s SWAT deputies knocked, used a battering ram and blew the locks off with a specialized shotgun. Massad fired two shots from a handgun. No one was hurt, but prosecutors charged him with five counts of first-degree attempted murder. Those 39 seconds will be key in Massad's attempted murder trial, set to begin Feb. 24, and they're emphasized in a stand your ground motion filed by his attorneys earlier this month.
[...]
The attorneys have only found one similar stand your ground case, deVlaming said. In 2015, John Derossett, a 65-year-old retired autoworker in Brevard County, shot at three men who had pulled his 42-year-old niece out of their home when she answered the door. The men turned out to be plain-clothes deputies there to arrest the niece on prostitution charges.

Facing attempted first-degree murder charges, Derossett filed a stand your ground motion. The law says it doesn't apply when the target of deadly force is a law enforcement officer on the job. But a judge ruled in December that the deputies hadn't clearly identified themselves, negating the law enforcement provision in this case.
[...]
What Derossett's case could mean for Massad is unclear. It shows that stand your ground isn't entirely out the window in cases involving police. But in Massad's case, there's no question that deputies tried to identify themselves - it's more a matter of whether prosecutors can convince a judge that Massad knew or should have known who they were.

Massad's defense argument will highlight the drawbacks of using a SWAT team to serve a search warrant late at night or early in the morning, said Bill Loughery, a former chief assistant prosecutor for Pinellas and Pasco counties.
[...]
Florida's stand your ground law changed in 2017 to put the burden of proof on prosecutors rather than defendants. But Roger Futerman, a Clearwater defense attorney, noted that the judge will have to believe two things: that Massad thought criminals were breaking into his house, and that he was reasonable in thinking that.
[...]

 

[PayrollNerd]

This trial is going to be interesting. Stand Your Ground doesn’t seem like it applies here. At least not for Masaad. Now if the woman had fired a gun, it might. She had no idea what was happening but Masaad had to have had an inkling.

 

[SeesSeas]

Ex-Port Richey mayor’s attempted murder trial gets last-minute delay
February 21, 2020
NEW PORT RICHEY — The attempted murder trial of former Port Richey Mayor Dale Massad will start either three weeks or nearly three months later than expected. A judge agreed to delay the trial Friday morning, during what was supposed to be a final pre-trial hearing.

Massad’s trial had been set to begin Monday. But his attorney Bjorn Brunvand began Friday’s hearing by telling Pinellas-Pasco Circuit Judge Mary Handsel that “a rather complicated issue” had come up at the last minute.
[...]
Another pre-trial hearing will take place Monday, and trial will be set for either March 16 or May 11.
[...]

Trial for former Port Richey mayor delayed
Updated: Feb 21, 2020 / 12:44 PM EST
NEW PORT RICHEY, Fla. (WFLA) – The trial for former Port Richey mayor Dale Massad has been delayed after new information has come to light.

During a Friday morning hearing, Massad’s attorney, Bjorn Brunvand asked to speak off the record with state prosecutors and Judge Mary Handsel.

Later, the judge said the trial would be pushed back. It is scheduled to begin either March 16 or May 11, the judge said.
[...]
Massad was in a wheelchair during the Friday hearing. His attorney said he is in relatively poor health.
[...]

 

[SeesSeas]

TRIAL March 16
March trial set for ex-Port Richey mayor accused of shooting at deputies
February 24, 2020
NEW PORT RICHEY — The attempted murder trial of former Port Richey Mayor Dale Massad will now begin March 16, a judge said during a pre-trial hearing Monday morning.
[...]

 

[SeesSeas]

Ex-Port Richey Mayor Dale Massad agrees to plea deal after shooting at deputies
February 26, 2021
Ex-Port Richey Mayor Dale Massad has agreed to a plea deal that will send him to state prison for three years, allowing him to avoid the potential life sentence he faced for firing on Pasco County Sheriff’s deputies serving a search warrant at his waterfront home in February 2019.
[...]
Next week, Massad plans to plead guilty to a reduced charge of aggravated assault on a law enforcement officer, the weapons offense and the resisting arrest charge in the attempted murder case, according to Massad’s attorneys and Pinellas-Pasco Assistant State Attorney Bryan Sarabia.

In exchange, Massad will be sentenced to three years in prison, and the state will drop the four remaining attempted murder charges.

He’ll also plead guilty to three charges of practicing medicine without a license and one count of unlawful use of a two-way communication device, said statewide prosecutor Rita Peters, who handled that case. Four other charges will be dropped. The deal will also carry a three-year sentence, which Massad will serve at the same time as the other charges, followed by 10 years of probation.
[...]

 

[PayrollNerd]

Why does this seem like preferential treatment. Any other person shooting at LE would get nailed to a wall. <insert eye roll>