A Flagler County jury on Tuesday exonerated 45-year-old Kevin Kevin J. Cichowski of three domestic violence charges, two of them felonies, stemming from an incident involving his wife at their C-Section house in September 2024. Cichowski was briefly a candidate for Palm Coast mayor in the special election of 2021. He cited a family member’s health as the reason for dropping out.
In the Sept. 10, 2024 incident, CNC, the alleged victim, had run naked and bruised to a neighboring house that morning. Cichowski told Flagler County Sheriff’s deputies that his wife was having a bipolar episode, but that nothing else had happened, according to the account he gave deputies at the time. He was bleeding from his right arm, the arrest report stated, but he didn’t know how that might have happened, suggesting that either his wife cut him while he was sleeping or he got cut when he was attempting to keep her from running out of the house.
CNC’s account was different. She accused Cichowski of assaulting her, biting her, strangling her and keeping her from leaving the house. “Due to the statements made by [Cichowski and CNC] and along with the visible redness to neck, bruising to her arms, legs and face, and bite marks,” his arrest report stated, Cichowski “was determined to be the primary
aggressor and was subsequently placed under arrest.”
He was charged with domestic battery by strangulation and false imprisonment, each a third-degree felony with a maximum penalty of five years in prison on each count, and a misdemeanor count of domestic battery. He could have faced prison time had he been convicted. He was initially booked at the Flagler County jail on $130,000 bond, which Circuit Judge Dawn Nichols, in her first day on the Flagler County felony bench on Oct. 7, deemed “really high for somebody who has no prior history and is 45 years old.” She lowered bond to $7,500, which Cichowski soon posted. He was allowed to return to his residence as long as CNC was not there.
The jury found him not guilty on all three counts. The two-day trial before Nichols, including jury selection, was prosecuted by Assistant State Attorney Tara Libby. Cichowski was represented by Assistant Public Defender Courtney Davison.
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