Free Republic

OCALA, Fla. (AP) - Police say a mother of 4 teenage boys has been charged with neglect after saying she was going "on strike" because she was fed up with them. Ocala police say 43-year-old Melissa Dean told the Department of Children and Families that she went on strike because no one would help her with the boys ages 17, 16, 14 and 13. Police have gone to Dean's home 12 times since September 2007 due to the boys' misbehavior. Dean tells the DCF that she thought there would be peace if she gave up her bedroom to 1 of...

OCALA, Fla. - A car traveling at high speed down a private airport runway ran off an embankment and was airborne for 200 feet before smashing into a tree early Saturday, killing all five young men in the vehicle, the Florida Highway Patrol said. Investigators did not know whether the BMW was alone or was racing another car on the air strip at the exclusive "fly-in" community of Jumbolair Aviation Estates, where pilot-actor John Travolta has a home, officials said. According to the preliminary investigation, the car ran off the 85-foot-high embankment at the end of the runway. When it...

OCALA, Fla. -- The Internal Affairs Division of the Marion County Sheriff's Office has launched an investigation into a clerical error that mistakenly put a woman behind bars for nine days. Amy Sellers, 22, of Ocala, was taken into custody about two weeks ago for a warrant that matched another 28-year-old woman named Amy Sellers. Sellers, who had not committed any crimes, said she was taken into custody and immediately thrown into the inmate population. "When I found out, I got no first appearance and I (didn't get) to see a judge," Sellers said. "They put me into population." The...

OCALA NATIONAL FOREST -- Leo Boatman paid $32.50 for a Greyhound ticket from Clearwater to Ocala the night of Jan. 2 -- a stolen AK-47 tucked in his bag and murder hidden in his heart, authorities said.

A US man in Florida confessed to a murder that never happened, hoping it would persuade his wife to leave him, the Ocala Star Banner reports. Teddy Akin, 28, told his wife he had killed a hitchhiker and stolen his wallet, and later repeated the same story to investigators after police arrested him. He claimed he hit the man on the neck, causing him to gasp and make a gurgling sound. He said he buried the body in a forest. Police eventually found the allegedly murdered man alive and astonished. Mr Akin admitted that his murder confession was bogus, a...

OCALA, Fla. -- Two boys, ages 9 and 10, were charged with felonies and taken away from school in handcuffs, accused of making violent drawings of stick figures. The boys were arrested Monday on charges of making a written threat to kill or harm another person, a second-degree felony.

OCALA, Fla. -- Two boys, ages 9 and 10, were charged with felonies and taken away from school in handcuffs, accused of making violent drawings of stick figures. The special education students used pencil and red crayon to draw primitive stick figure scenes on scrap paper that showed a 10-year-old classmate being stabbed and hung, police said. "The officer found they were drawing these pictures for the sole purpose of intimidating and scaring the victim," said Ocala Police Sgt. Russ Kern. The boy depicted in the drawings told his teacher, who took the sketches and contacted the school dean, Marty...