Sheriff Grady Judd news conference Monday, Feb. 19

we've got a lot of things to talk about so I'll get started I hope you all were having a good day first off I want to talk to you about a murder that occurred of a homeless man he was not only a homeless man but he was an operator he worked his way around in the area he met people and other homeless camps he would he had a system in place and he would just go throughout the community ripping off people wherever he could he happened to meet up with a Christopher Taylor and a Christina Sluss who had just come here from South Carolina and he said hey I got a system you got a car we're good you drive me to the bank I open up an account I get a debit card and then we'll go to an ATM withdraw the money and we'll have cash and we'll rip off the bank's will they did this over a period of time but he got to be a nuisance and he got two aggravating Christopher Taylor and he came by on a Saturday morning and we got to go to the bank we got to go to the bank we got to go to the bank and Christopher just had a short temper and he had enough sorry Christopher Taylor here started to beat the victim he he beat the victim first with a frying pan and apparently he broke the handle of the frying pan and this was in the city of Winter Haven as I'll get to in a minute he beat the victim with a frying pan and that broke and he beat the victim with another frying pan and then he tells us girlfriend Christina hey go downstairs and get Gary my brother and tell him to bring me the bat so Christina goes down years tells Gary Christopher wants the bat and he started to beat our victim with the bat Chris beating and beating and our victim passed out well then he comes to and he begs Christopher please don't beat me anymore please let me go well that didn't work so well so they started beating me and beating him and beating him some more oh by the way did I tell you that he had Kristina turn on some music some music to beat the victim by it's ICP and saying Clown Posse so now we have music to beat the victim by and he beats the victim unconscious again when he comes through he's screaming and crying and hollering I didn't mean to make you mad I didn't mean to hurt you please let me go let me go Gary has to talk to one of the neighbors and say hey don't worry it's just Chris and his girlfriend fighting downstairs well in fact what it was was our victim screaming and screaming and screaming well the victim tries to leave the house Christopher tackles him and then begins to choke him and he chokes him unconscious and he starts gurgling according to Kristina and he stops moving well immediately that they the three of them to include Gary put it put our victim in in garbage bags and they put him in the in the bathtub well what's interesting about that is well you know it's it's been a hard hard day's work because they estimate that Chris for beat this guy for between an hour and a half and two hours so they put him in the garbage bags and threw him over into the bathtub and guess what then they all three went to Christopher and Gary's parents house to have dinner so they all had a good dinner together then Christopher says hey it's dark let's Google and find a place to dump the victim just outside of Polk County the gun found out that Bowling Green was outside of Polk County so they drive him to the old Bowling Green Road and turn off on the old Bowling Green Road and dump the body they made a tactical error they dumped him in Polk County and that's where we found him pursuant to a grove worker who was working in a grove have I told you lately that my homicide team is the absolute best in the entire nation so now we have a person who by the way has they severed right hand and is cut up and Veta with no identification our homicide team identifies him not only do they identify him they're able to find out that he owns the bicycle and they work through their sources and through people in the community that once again cooperated and trust us and gave us information and voila we found the bike it was behind Christopher and Christina's house or their apartment they live in apartment a at 18:30 Avenue Oh Southwest and of course they tell lies about that Christopher ultimately gets arrested for lying during a capital crime investigation and he's out of the picture and now we're dealing with Gary and Kristina Gary and Kristina finally confessed to us they confess that Christopher spent an hour and a half to two hours killing our victim guess what when we seized their car and hear me out our victims missing his right hand what do we find on the car but a zombie sticker with no right arm we're told that what the three of them did was watched horror movies non-stop Gary Taylor is from Winter Haven Christopher and Kristina just came from another state Gary has not been with Christopher and Kristina but he makes the statement another one bites the dust we suspect them of committing more murders in the United States and we're not saying anymore now stand by for news well I have to talk about Deandra coffer he's smoking marijuana you know that harmless drug that nonviolent drug he's smoking marijuana just before he beats his girlfriend to death and what is the horrible tragedy that Kiara Butler his girlfriend does who's 32 she is reading the Andres three-year-old a book and trying to teach him to count and say apple' when all of a sudden he screams at her you stop reading that voodoo book to my kid and he sends the three-year-old out of the room as soon as he sends the three-year-old out of the room he begins to beat Kiera and he beats her and he beats her and he beats her and then he chokes her and then he chokes her and then he grabs the three-year-old and the infant leaves goes down the street a neighbor sees that his hands all bloody and says and he eventually called 9-1-1 or the neighbor called 911 he took the phone I don't have the details but he makes the statement I beat her I told her not to read that voodoo to my kids and I don't know if she's dead or not well let me tell you it was not a voodoo book it was a child's prayer book and Kiera was doing what a good mother would she was reading to the three-year-old from a child's prayer book and on this particular page there was an apple tree with nine apples and she was simply trying to teach the child in the bedroom up in the bed like good Mother's would how to read and how to count apples and she's dead today she's currently be an jurist charged with second-degree murder but we're gonna be talking to the State Attorney's Office later at the conclusion of the investigation but he absolutely beat her to death okay are you interested in the softball coach all right billy-ray no is 33 years of age and he works in Winterhaven as I understand but he's also hired by the school board to be an assistant softball coach at frost roof one of his previous players when he also coached travel softball was our victim Billy Ray was also a friend of her daddy and a group of people went to a concert to include Billy know and the girl and a couple of other people and after the other people were taken home Billy no engaged the 17 year old child in sexual conduct in our society our civilized society an adult cannot have sex with a child billy-ray obviously has not learned that and as a result he was arrested and placed in the county jail and that's where he is today unless he's made bond okay anything else I don't know billy-ray know has coached softball and as I understand is a good softball coach and his coach for some period of time we want to know if there are other victims I can tell you if he's willing to have sex with one child that's under the age of 18 certainly he may be willing to have sex with other children under the age of 18 and that's what we want to know if there's any other victims I hope not maybe sir anything else for today what would you like to know you know my heart breaks for those 17 children that died as a result of a vicious mad killer that went on to that school campus the Florida Legislature is in session and as I understand certainly has an interest in modifying the laws in the florida legislature and the governor needs your support right now there's no one answer to this issue but there certainly is processes and protocols that can reduce the probabilities of an event occurring and if an event occurs as horrific as it is there are systems and processes we can put in place to either eliminate or mitigate the damage certainly there needs to be more teacher training more hardening of the targets the schools there needs to be stronger teeth in the Baker Act mental health evaluation system currently the law says if we somebody thinks someone is a threat to themselves or others then we can pick them up take them to a receiving facility to where they can be held up to 72 hours for mental health evaluation that's not enough as we have seen in the past or around this state and around this nation we can see some very frightening writings some very frightening photographs some very frightening text but it doesn't rise to the level of a threat and if we hear about this and we go there we're not able to do an intervention with an arrest or a mental help the Baker Act if they don't show that they're an imminent threat to themselves or others we need more teeth in the Baker Act so when we find these people that we're really worried about we can get them to help up front that's important but for us for the sake of argument let's look at where we are now there are interventions there is training there is hardening of some of the schools and we talked about how those things need to be improved upon but the question is what do we do when the active shooter shows up and what I'm suggesting to you is not something that we want to do but something we have to do and here's what we have already done in this county with our Sentinel program and I'm not suggesting that's the only program we know the data tells us that when the crazed madman arrives on campus with a gun with murder in his eyes that the deed is usually completed within two to five minutes and in Broward County it was three minutes we know that the police response is going to be a plus five minutes 911 doesn't work when we get the 911 call the shooter is there committing the evil bead so what do we do one solution is that you go to the school staff and you seek out those that will agree to be sentinels on the campus and call them what you want guardians on the campus that will protect the children you select them you provide detailed background investigations you provide detailed psychological evaluations then you give them training like we do in our program we require more firearms hours of training than even the police academy requires treated via certified police officer in Florida we require them time to train and qualify at a higher percentage that even the police academy standards in the state of Florida require then you allow them to carry a concealed firearm and you don't have one and you don't have to but you have three four five on the campus so god forbid that horrible day ever occur that you have a group of people armed with guns that run to the threat to neutralize it before they harm our children ideally or even if they're shooting stop starts you mitigate now oh I hear something go oh we don't want to do that well okay Einstein you got a better idea do you have a better idea of how to stop a crazed mad person armed with a gun charging a campus with the plan in place to kill children well no they got an opinion they run their mouth Talk's cheap I got a plan the Florida Legislature is concern I talked to the governor he's concerned and is working toward a solution I talked to several legislators they are going to put forth solutions the Sentinel program as we have it is not the complete plan the Sentinel program is the last best solution when the shooter shows up when everything else has failed and I ask you this for me it's not a heavy lift what would you want to happen if your child is in the line of fire would you want a teacher that was very well selected and trained to have a gun to protect your child or a janitor or a school administrator or a deputy sheriff or a police officer you don't care I don't care my grandbabies are on these campuses and your children are on these campuses and your grandchildren are on these campuses and we have an obligation to protect them there's going to be another active shooter on a school campus whether that's elementary junior middle school high school or college there's going to be another one someplace in this country and Florida has the ability to show the leadership to show that we are willing to take the responsibility for looking out for the best interests of our children ladies and gentlemen it would be a horrible day to have a shootout with an active shooter on one of our campuses with our children running around it would be a worst day for the active shooter to be able to shoot and kill and shoot and kill and we're not able to protect the children and that's where we are right now I don't want to hear about all this red or about gun control that's another argument for another day we have gun control on the campuses in the state of Florida it says nobody possesses a gun except a law enforcement officer that's gun control how did that work in Broward County it didn't because only the good people didn't have a gun on the campus that day only the law-abiding people didn't have a gun on the campus that day the criminals gonna show up with a gun whether he buys it legally or he steals it or he buys it off of the street there are millions and millions and millions and millions of guns in this country so let's save the gun control argument for another day and let's focus on what we're going to do today when everything else fails to protect our children and keep them from dying and that's whether it's at a school in a business in a church do you know in a church in a business we're good to go because businesspeople can allow guns and trained churches can allow guns in train I have I have authorized my team which is simply the best in the nation since the shooting in Texas of the church we've probably trained between 500 and a thousand people and prepped them to protect their church or their business so while you can protect your church you can protect your business you can protect your home you can't protect your schools that's pretty crazy it's up to us to act I have the program in place Southeastern College is on board we are working with and signing the contracts for another private college and I've had several private schools call me and say how do we do this it's time for all the people in the state of Florida to say okay we'll have the we'll have the other discussions later but let's give the law enforcement officers the Baker Act tools when we suspect somebody can be dangerous to get them help and then let's have a program a sentinel program so that we can keep the kids safe or do our best to protect the kids when all else fails any other questions I'm not talking about that today I think made my position perfectly clear there's gun control today at the schools in Florida how did that work it didn't we need a series of things we can do that I outlined earlier but when all of that fails we must be able to protect our children we don't sit discuss security measures that we will use but I can assure you that we will we will make sure that our sentinels can run to stand in the gap I mean we've got coaches that ran to stand in the gap with no guns why not give them a fighting chance to protect the students it's easy to run onto a campus when you know nobody's got a gun here but me but when they run on to that campus with that wild look in their eyes and that gun of whatever description and all of a sudden there's three or four or five people laying it to them it's a game-changer now they're on the defense instead of the offense and folks it just stands to reason I submit to you there is not maybe they're meant to you that the overwhelming number of parents if they could wind the clock back and we can say well hand you a gun here because there's an active shooter coming in 30 minutes the do you want this gun to protect your kids show me a parent who wouldn't have taken advantage of that if we couldn't get police officers there to protect them first this is not rocket science but it's much more important than that and I hope and pray it never happens again but if you want to reduce the probabilities let the active shooter know that four or five or six or seven people are going to run out of classrooms and administrative buildings and lunch rooms with a gun and start shooting at you when you show up with your gun it's game changer promise you you start shooting somebody it modifies their behavior that quick will even have them apologising for ever showing up with the gun by the time we get the first three or four rounds in them we'll have a game-changer if we'll just protect our children and listen to me clearly don't turn those cameras off yet this is selected vetted people who pass backgrounds psychological and have in-depth training that meets and exceeds the florida police officer standards today this is not anyone who wants a gun on a campus this is special people for dangerous times go ahead raise your hand which one of you who has a child on a school campus doesn't want somebody there with a gun to protect your baby any of you want to leave your baby's life up to whether or not the active shooter gets to them and shoots them any of you I don't see any hands all we have to do is approach this as how do we want our babies protected and then we can have the gun control debate and all of that later on we have that discussion next month but what are we going to do today is that all the questions I got plenty more answers but it's along the same lines as when I just gave you thank you very much have a good day

Channel: WFLA News Channel 8

Views: 433,407

Keywords: wflatampa, wflanews, wflatampanews

Id: 0UnB-npDN2g

Length: 30min 59sec (1859 seconds)

Published: Mon Feb 19 2018