A jury of four women and two men found Brenan Hill guilty of second degree murder and two other charges in the shooting death of Savannah Gonzalez, 22, after deliberating two hours and 45 minutes today. He faces life in prison when Circuit Judge Terence Perkins, who presided over the five-day trial, sentences him at a later date.
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Malacompra Beach Annexation Into Palm Coast Draws Frosty but Not Fatal Response from Joint Committee
The joint local government committee of county and city representatives that met for the second time approached at arm’s length Palm Coast City Council member Theresa Pontieri’s proposal that Palm Coast annex into the city the county beach and access at Malacompra Road.
Florida’s ‘Voucher’ System Adds 123,000 Students Attending Private School at Public Expense
Nearly 123,000 new students have received private-school vouchers after state lawmakers this year passed a major expansion of voucher programs, while a group that administers the programs says they will not bring an “exodus” from public schools as critics have predicted.
Brenan Hill Takes Stand in His Defense, Weeping, then Seething that Shooting Savannah Gonzalez Was an ‘Accident’
It was not an exactly calm man the jury saw when Brenan Hill took the stand this afternoon in his own defense. Not the sort of man who helped himself much in his trial on a second-degree murder charge that could send him to prison for life if he is convicted: when the prosecution cross-examined him, he was angry, exasperated and at times barely responsive.
Ed Danko Attacks City Staffer With Baseless Claims in Public Meeting, Drawing Sharp Rebuke from Mayor
Palm Coast City Council member Ed Danko verbally attacked and disparaged the city’s resiliency and sustainability officer in a public meeting on Tuesday, baselessly calling her presentation “propaganda,” questioning why she had a job, and sparring with Mayor David Alfin, who brought him under control.
Kwentel Moultrie Pleads to Murder, Will Serve 45 Years in Prison on Series of Convictions
Kwentel Moultrie, the 24-year-old former Palm Coast resident convicted last year of raping a 16-year-old girl, this morning pleaded guilty to a second degree murder charge and was sentenced to 35 years in prison. He will serve that sentence consecutively to the 10-year sentence for the rape charge.
Almost a Good Day for Brenan Hill in Murder Trial: Jury Does Not Hear Him Speak. Then the Hammer Falls.
In the third day of trial for Brenan Hill, 34, who faces a second-degree murder charge in the shooting death of Savannah Gonzalez, 22, the prosecution built its case through forensic evidence and almost a dozen witnesses today, including testimony from a firearm expert who appeared to all but demolish the defense’s claim that Hill could fire the gun accidentally, as he claims.
Palm Coast Council’s Pontieri Makes Startling Move to Annex Malacompra Park: ‘Our Citizens Are Entitled to Their Own Beach’
In a startling proposal that may revive city-Hammock conflicts dormant since the mid 2000s, Palm Coast City Council member Theresa Pontieri on Tuesday said the city should consider annexing the county’s Malacompra Park so Palm Coast can have its own beach. The idea did not get a warm reception from fellow council members or others.
Jury Hears Brenan Hill in a Confederacy of Lies About Shooting that Led to Girlfriend’s Death
Brenan Hill lied at least six times times about what led to him shooting Savannah La-Rynn Gonzalez in the head on March 26, 2021, including a lie to his mother. The 22-year-old Palm Coast woman never recovered. She died last Nov. 9. The jury heard most of those lies today in Hill’s second day of trial on a second-degree murder charge that could send him to prison for life if he’s convicted.
Flagler Beach Will Consider New Impact Fees for Fire, Police, Parks, and Library, and Higher Fees for Water and Sewer
The Flagler Beach City Commission Thursday will vote on what could be the single-largest tax increase on development in the city’s history. The city is considering adopting higher impact fees on water and sewer connection, and imposing new impact fees for police, fire, parks and recreation services, which it has not had until now.
Florida Wants ‘Marsy’s Law,’ Designed for Crime Victims, to Prevent Death Penalty Appeals
Nearly five years after voters passed a constitutional amendment about victims’ rights, Attorney General Ashley Moody’s office Monday urged the Florida Supreme Court to use the measure to make it harder for Death Row inmates to get stays of execution.
Jury Selection in Brenan Hill’s Trial on Murder Charge Keys In on Guns, Violence and Intent
Brennan Hill, 32 at the time, shot Savannah Gonzalez in March 2021 near the Microtel in Palm Coast. Hill’s attorney, made his intentions clear in his remarkably brief interactions with potential jurors at the end of a day of jury selection Monday: the shooting was accidental. It had nothing to do with domestic violence. It was a homicide, but not a murder.
Obviously, the prosecution disagrees, though it did not tip its hand today as Bettman did.
Flagler County Joins St. Johns in Banning ‘Floating Structures’ Used as Unregulated Party Stores on Waterways
A month after St. Johns County did so, the Flagler County Commission last week banned all floating structures used on county rivers, lakes or inlets “like a neighborhood convenience store on the water,” as a county memo describes them, and that the county considers unregulated nuisances that at times damage the surrounding ecology.
Dead White Males Return: Behind Florida GOP’s Push for Christian-Leaning Classic Learning Test Instead of SAT
The new Classic Learning Test has been pushed by conservative politicians and religious activists as an alternative to the SAT and ACT, and will now be accepted as a measure of admission in Florida colleges and universities. Of the 12 private institutions in Florida that now accept the CLT, 11 are religiously affiliated.
Even A Great Superintendent Can’t Fix a Clueless School Board
If you think the appointment of LaShakia Moore as superintendent will make a difference, think again. Moore’s biggest job will be to run interference to save what’s left of this district from the Huns, because the problem was never with the administration or the ranks. It’s with the majority of a board that doesn’t know its role, doesn’t know its limits, and doesn’t know education from flip-flops.
Should You be Worried About Monster Hurricane Lee? Models and Emergency Chief Say No, But Erosion a Concern
For the last several days, Hurricane Lee, the most powerful storm of the season yet and a potential record-breaker, has been as if making a beeline for Florida, from the middle Atlantic. But models and Flagler County’s emergency management director say the hurricane in five days will make an abrupt turn north well before it comes near the Florida Peninsula. Still, the dangerous storm is expected to cause more erosion on an already weakened Flagler County shore, with hurricane season just beginning to peak.
Ex-Matanzas Student Facing Adult Gun and Molestation Charges Here Is Attending High School in Wisconsin
Marshall Thomas, the former Matanzas High School student who was charged as an adult with gun theft and, separately, charged as an adult with the sexual assault of a Matanzas student at school in May 2022, was enrolled in a charter school in northern Wisconsin after posting $60,000 bond in Flagler County. Both cases are pending, with Thomas’s next scheduled pre-trial in Circuit Court in Bunnell on Oct. 11. A parent in Wisconsin is concerned about Thomas’s presence among students there.
Bunnell Elementary Principal Evensen Resigns, Saying She ‘Certainly’ Does Not Deserve What’s Happening to Her
Donelle Evensen this morning announced her resignation as Bunnell Elementary principal five weeks after being named to the position, and not quite three weeks after being placed on leave following her approval of an assembly where faculty segregated Black students. At no point in either letters does Evensen take responsibility or offer any regret for the tenor of the assembly or the misjudgments that led to it.
Flagler County Bans Beach Bonfires in Turtle-Nesting Season, Joining Prohibitions Long in Place in 3 Towns
Thirteen years ago, after much controversy, the Flagler Beach City Commission banned bonfires on the beach during turtle season. Beverly Beach and Marineland have similar bans. But it was only on Monday that the ban extended to the rest of the county’s beaches–18 miles of shoreline in all–as the County Commission voted 5-0 to approve an ordinance.
Flagler School Board’s Sally Hunt Hijacks New Superintendent’s Triumph with a Hit List of Resentments
The highlight at Tuesday evening’s meeting of the Flagler County School Board should have been the triumphal appointment of LaShakia Moore as superintendent, a rare unifying moment for an often divided school board. It was briefly all that, until School Board member Sally Hunt hijacked the occasion with what amounted to a hit list for coming meetings: School Board attorney Kristy Gavin. School Board Chair Cheryl Massaro. The school board’s own conduct. “Bullies.” “The media.”
$12.3 Million Pedestrian Bridge Over State Road 100 Gets Its Grand Opening on Sept. 19
The tin-tented, recently rust-painted and frequently derided pedestrian bridge over State Road 100 will get its public grand opening celebration the afternoon of September 19. A coat of darkening chemicals was applied to the tipi-like stainless steel tent over the bridge to diminish its reflection’s almost blinding effect at sunup and sundown, depending on which direction one was traveling.
With K-12 Health Standards Mum on Abortion, Younger Floridians Seek More Influence Ahead of Court Case
The Florida Supreme Court will hear oral arguments on Sept. 8 on the abortion issues and could reverse the course the court set more than 30 years ago. Some young Floridians are turning to the future of reproductive freedom in Florida, as through Floridians Protecting Freedom, the group that launched a pro-abortion initiative to add a constitutional referendum on reproductive freedom to the November 2024 ballot.
LaShakia Moore Appointed Superintendent in Historic Vote, But Occasion Is Marred by Grievances
The Flagler County School Board this evening voted unanimously to appoint LaShakia Moore superintendent, eliminating the “interim” part of the title she had held since July 1 and making her the first Black superintendent in the county’s history. But it wasn’t entirely a joyful occasion.
Witnesses Say C.J. Nelson Jr. Had ‘Handled’ Jammed Gun Before Shooting of 18-Month-Old Girl
C.J. Nelson Jr., the 21-year-old resident of 2 Ranwood Lane arrested the night of the fatal shooting of an 18-month-old girl at that house Sunday, was said by “more than one” witness in the house that he had been handling the gun that fired the fatal shot, and that he had described the gun as “jammed” before the shooting, according to his arrest report.
In Commanding Control of Her Interview and the Board, LaShakia Moore Appears Poised to Be Voted Superintendent
LaShakia Moore this morning was fully in control of a Flagler County School Board that has often been unmoored and adrift for much of the past year as she parried questions and asserted how she would handle her first hundred days as superintendent, if the board were to appoint her into that role this evening. There seems to be little doubt that this evening’s vote will be anticlimactic, and that come 5:15 p.m., Moore will be voted the new, permanent superintendent.
Judge Rules Unconstitutional DeSantis Plan That Eliminated Black Representation
Circuit Judge J. Lee Marsh ruled that a congressional redistricting plan pushed through the Legislature by Gov. Ron DeSantis violated the Florida Constitution and needs to be redrawn. The judge sided with voting-rights groups in a lawsuit focused on a North Florida district that in the past elected Black Democrat Al Lawson but was dramatically revamped during the 2022 redistricting process. White Republicans won all North Florida congressional districts in the November elections.
Channeling George Wallace, DeSantis Uses Education to Keep Blacks Down
Despite those idiotic “Build the Wall” campaign ads, he didn’t seem to be a Trump-style racist when he took office in 2019. There was hope he’d acknowledge our sad history and move us toward a more equitable society. But he didn’t. And he isn’t. Maybe the Napoleonically ambitious DeSantis decided white nationalism was his ticket to the Republican presidential nomination. His racism is less overt than Trump’s or George Wallace’s but almost as damaging.
Flagler Sheriff’s Corrections Deputy Colin Haggerty Arrested for Boating Under the Influence on the Intracoastal
Colin Haggerty, a 38-year-old Flagler County Sheriff’s corrections deputy, was arrested and charged with boating under the influence of alcohol on Saturday (Sept. 2) in the Intracoastal just north of the Hammock Dunes Bridge.
Stop Blaming Line Workers for Poor Service. It’s CEOs’ Fault.
Ever get mad at a delivery driver for bringing your pizza late? Stop, and consider: It’s late because an overpaid boss is probably making two employees do the job of 10 as chronic but unnecessary and often intentional understaffing plagues many of America’s largest retailers and fast food corporations.
Sisco Deen, Giant Archivist and Historian of Flagler County from One of Its Original Families, Dies at 83
Claude Sisco Deen, Flagler County’s premier archivist and a leading historian of local families and culture, died Thursday evening in Palm Coast a little after sunset. He had been the research maven behind Flagler County’s centennial in 2017, was that year’s Flagler County Veteran of the Year, and built unparalleled databases of local family histories and historical documents.
School Board May Vote On Making LaShakia Moore Permanent Superintendent (or Not) on Tuesday
Unscheduled (and illegal) huddles aside, the Flagler County School Board is holding four separate meetings Tuesday, the last one at 5:15 p.m., where one of the agenda items is a potential vote on ending the search for a new superintendent and permanently appointing LaShakia Moore to the position.
Sally Hunt Wanted to Censure School Board Chair For Going Off Script in Talk Over Segregated Assembly
Flagler County School Board Chair Cheryl Massaro said fellow Board member Sally Hunt considered calling for a vote of censure against her because Massaro did not stick to a script provided her before last week’s press conference denouncing Bunnell Elementary’s segregated assembly days earlier.
Florida Seeks Wider Federal Disaster Declaration Than to Seven Counties Ahead of Biden Visit
DeSantis and state Emergency Management Director Kevin Guthrie said Friday they plan to ask the White House to include more counties in the disaster declaration signed Thursday by President Joe Biden. The declaration, in part, makes federal money available to help people in Citrus, Dixie, Hamilton, Lafayette, Levy, Suwannee and Taylor counties.
Why Is the DeSantis Campaign Stalling? Americans Don’t Like Imperial Governors.
Why is Ron DeSantis’s campaign stalling? Current and former governors would say: Because he has become an imperial governor-– one who believes he is all-powerful and that all his decisions will be just applauded and never questioned or opposed.
For Charlie Ericksen, a Poignant Farewell from Colleagues and Friends in a Chamber He’d (Mostly) Loved
Flagler County government’s Holly Albanese organized a Celebration of Life of former County Commissioner Charlie Ericksen, who died on July 31. The celebration was held in the commission’s chamber last Tuesday, where some three dozen colleagues and friends and two of Ericksen’s sons attended, some of whom speaking with poignancy and candor.
Sheriff’s Michael Breckwoldt Demoted to Corporal Following Investigation of Drinking Incident at Finn’s Bar
Michael Breckwoldt, the 20-year veteran of the Flagler County Sheriff’s Office who was in charge of the agency’s narcotics unit until last May, was demoted from sergeant to corporal and placed on last-chance probation for a year and a half as a result of an incident at Finn’s Beachside Pub in Flagler Beach, where Breckwoldt’s drinking led to “offensive behavior,” in violation of agency policy, and where he behaved in an unbecoming way toward patrons.
Rural Counties Begin Recovery from Hurricane Idalia: ‘As Bad as It Is, It Still Ain’t as Bad as It Could Have Been’
Category 3 Hurricane Idalia made landfall in Taylor County’s Keaton Beach area, and county Sheriff Wayne Padgett said other hard-hit areas included downtown Perry and Steinhatchee, “a little fishing village on the coast down there,” which he said had the most storm surge. “As bad as it is, it still ain’t as bad as it could have been,” Padgett said.
Great News: Brian and Hailey McMillan Buy the Palm Coast and Ormond Beach Observer
Hailey and Brian McMillan are the new co-owners of the Palm Coast and Ormond Beach Observer, an acquisition roundly applauded by the paper’s staff, community leaders and competitors. Matt and John Walsh founded the Observer in late 2009 and hired McMillan as their first editor. He’d led the paper until his reluctant departure 2022.
Hurricane Idalia Makes Landfall as Cat-3 Hurricane; Local Impacts on Flagler Limited, Evacuations Rescinded
After Hurricane Idalia became an “extremely dangerous” Category 4 storm, it made landfall as a Cat-3 in Florida’s Big Bend this morning. Effects on Flagler and Palm Coast are expected to be limited to rain and wind gusts as the storm’s track has shifted north.
Hurricane Idalia’s Track Again Shifts North, Further Reducing Feared Flagler Impacts
Hurricane Idalia’s track shifted north again, further away from Flagler County, in the National Hurricane Center’s Tuesday evening report. That further reduces but by no means eliminates tropical storm force impacts in Flagler County, especially inland.
Hurricane Idalia: Tropical Storm Impact in Flagler Wednesday as Schools Will Close and Shelter Open at Rymfire
Hurricane Idalia will make landfall in western Florida Wednesday and rapidly transit across the state, impacting at least western Flagler County with tropical storm force winds and rain. Flagler County schools will be closed Wednesday. A combined general population and special needs shelter will open at Rymfire Elementary in late afternoon Tuesday.
DeSantis Wants Children to Be Ignorant, Intolerant and Narrow-Minded
In Ron DeSantis’ Florida, teachers are expected to present a version of the world in which “gender” is not to be spoken of, “gay” likewise, there’s no climate crisis — the weather’s always changing! — Shakespeare needs to be toned down, the human body is disgusting, slavery had an upside, America is the best country that ever was and ever will be, and books that challenge any of these self-evident truths must be banned.
White Supremacist Murders 3 Black People at Dollar General in Jacksonville, Before Shooting Himself
Sheriff T.K. Waters said two males and one female — all Black — were killed in the shootings, and the shooter killed himself. He had been armed with an AR-15 style rifle and a handgun, with the rifle showing several swastikas. At the time of the news conference, the shooter’s name had not yet been identified, but Sheriff Waters said the man had authored manifestos that were provided to his parents, the media, and federal agents. The sheriff referenced the “disgusting ideology of hate.”
Flagler Schools Have a ‘Subgroup’ Problem. It’s Not Blacks. It’s Not Even Students.
It is now so routine to reduce individual students to cogs among subgroups enslaved to the expectations of standardized testing that our educators have lost sight of their purpose. The state’s transformation of education into a dehumanizing machinery is to blame. So is the Flagler County School Board’s emphasis on running the district as a business, and now branding its superintendent a “CEO.” The individuality and dignity of students is lost to a damaging bottom-line mentality.
Deep Disagreements Remain Between School District and Cities and Builders Over Enrollment and Impact Fee Dues
Are Flagler County’s public schools adding students? Will the district need to build new schools? Should it be drawing money from developers today even though it has no certain plans to build schools yet? Those questions were asked and answered with varying degrees of certainty and a lot more disagreements on Thursday in the latest meeting of a joint committee of local government representatives in charge of reviewing how much money developers are required to pay to defray the cost of new school construction.
Flagler School Board Members Meet Behind Closed Doors to ‘Debrief’ Until Attorney Breaks Them Up
All five Flagler County School Board members met behind a closed door after a press conference this morning, until the school board attorney, who had been unaware of the meeting, broke them up. One of the board member insists no business before the board was discussed, and that the meeting was intended only to tell the superintendent she had done a good job at the press conference.
School Officials Forcefully Denounce ‘Segregation’ Assembly But Steps Ahead Are Vague Beyond ‘Conversations’
The denunciations were forceful and Interim Superintendent LaShakia Moore’s air of command over the most serious crisis of her tenure as interim was evident at a press conference this morning. But the steps ahead, beyond community meetings, more encounters with parents and students, and talk of “professional learning” with school employees, are far less clear even as the district positions itself against potential litigation.
Bunnell Principal Donelle Evensen on Administrative Leave as District Faces Fallout of Segregated Assembly
Donelle Evensen, the principal at Bunnell Elementary School for mere weeks, was placed on paid administrative leave today, and Superintendent LaShakia Moore asked that a three-hour board workshop scheduled for today, where she was to be interviewed for the permanent job, be postponed.
School Board Will Hold 3-Hour Interview of LaShakia Moore for Superintendent, But Hopes You Won’t Attend
The Flagler County School Board is holding one of its most important public meetings of the year Thursday, between 9 a.m. and noon. Misleadingly referring to it as a “retreat,” the board will hold an extended interview with Interim Superintendent LaShakia Moore to determine whether it should end its search for a permanent superintendent and appoint Moore in September. Some members of the School Board would rather you did not know about the meeting, and did not attend.
Lyonel Jeune, 65, Arrested on 1st Degree Felony Charge in Hit-and-Run Death of William Rembert, 56
Lyonel Jeune, a 65-year-old resident of Beacon Mill Lane in Palm Coast, was arrested over the weekend and charged with a first-degree felony in the hit-and-run death of William Joseph Rembert, 56, on Dec. 1, 2021, at Palm Coast Parkway and Leanni Way, near Belle Terre Parkway. The charge carries a penalty of up to 30 years in prison on conviction.