A judge has ruled that Marissa Alexander can remain free on bond after the Florida State Attorney filed a motion claiming that the defendant violated her release conditions numerous times, The Florida Times-Union reports. Circuit Court Judge James Daniel denied Assistant State Attorney Richard Mantei‘s request to revoke Alexander’s bail for “going out shopping for clothes, driving family members to the hair shop and airport, getting a new driver’s license, visiting the bank and seeing a sister-in-law.”
Mantei’s stated to the judge that Alexander, 33, was on home detention while performing her errands. The conditions of her detention prohibit her from leaving her residence except for court appearances, medical emergencies and to satisfy any requirements of her pretrial services program. She has been free on bond since Thanksgiving after getting a new trial in her aggravated assault case for firing a warning shot during an altercation with her husband, Rico Gray.
Alexander’s lawyer, Bruce Zimet, countered the state’s argument by saying that all of his client’s actions were approved by the Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office, which angered Judge Daniel. Zimet said the court ordered Alexander to speak with Jacksonville authorities before making her trips, which they approved without checking with the judge. Since Alexander did not knowingly violate the bond, Judge Daniel saw fit to allow her to remain in home detention.
April Wilson, an 18-year veteran of the Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office, was present for Friday’s hearing. Wilson approved all of Alexander’s trips, stating in her tearful testimony that her understanding of the court order would allow for these brief stops she made while under house arrest. After today’s hearing, however, it appears that both sides understand Judge Daniel’s orders and will move forward from there. “I think it was handled how it needed to be handled. The judge is now aware and everybody else is now aware of what was going on. Things got brought out in the open that’s always a good thing,” said Mantei, as reported by Florida Times-Union.
Despite having earned dismal approval ratings for his presidency at the end of last year, President Barack Obama (pictured) was still named the nation’s most admired man of 2013, according to a recent Gallup Poll. The Commander-in-Chief has won the honor for the 57th time, over a six-year period, since Gallup began asking Americans the question for the past 6 years, reports Gallup Politics. The Gallup organization polled people ages 18 and older via telephone from December 5th to December 8th across the United States to respond to a question about the person they admired the most on the planet. Sixteen percent of Americans named Obama as the individual they most look up to, and he was followed by former President George W. Bush and Pope Francis, who both shared the No. 2 spot as far as admired males with 4 percent each.
The former United States Secretary of State, U.S. Senator, and First Lady Hillary Clinton took poll honors as the most-admired female on the globe with a 15 percent rating. Clinton was followed by talk show maven Oprah Winfrey, who garnered 6 percent of the vote. Coming in behind Winfrey and sharing their highly coveted spotlight is First Lady Michelle Obama and former Alaska governor Sarah Palin with each receiving 5 percent of the poll votes.
article by Ruth Manuel-Logan via newsone.com
The Obama administration announced on Tuesday that more than 6 million Americans have obtained health insurance through the new health care law, a major achievement for the president and his team, which has been sharply criticized for a sloppy rollout of “Obamacare” that included a website that barely functioned for weeks.
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