Miami FL: Another Stand You Ground Case. Security Guard Shoots Unamed Men Now Arrested And Charge With First Degree Murder

MIAMI (WSVN) — A South Florida family is speaking out after their loved one was shot to death in the parking lot of a local strip club.

Friday morning, family members of 29-year-old Kijuan Byrd spoke to the media at a local funeral home and expressed their grief and anger about a shooting that left their son dead. “Kijuan is my only child and now he’s gone, he’s gone. My baby is dead, and it’s senseless,” said Arleen Byrd. “I don’t understand why, and I don’t know what I’m going to tell my grand-babies when they say to me, ‘Grandma, where’s my daddy?’ I don’t know what I’m going to say. My son is gone, and I’m angry.”

On June 1, Police said Byrd was fatally shot six times by a security guard outside Club Lexx on Northwest 27th Avenue. “He’s my baby, my youngest son. He was shot twice in the back. He was going to try to get away,” said Donald Byrd.

Tonya, a Club Lexx employee, witnessed the shooting and described the scene. “They were just coming out of the club, so I know they weren’t armed or anything,” she said. “They started arguing, and the security guard just up and fired. But he just insisted to go behind them and keep up the altercation.”

According to the police report, the security guard, Lukace Kendle, told police that several times, he walked by the truck where Byrd and his friend, Michael Smathers, were sitting. Kendle told police he then heard one of the vehicle’s doors open, and he heard one of the men say they was going to kill him. Kendle said he then turned around and fired.

Byrd’s family has since hired Trayvon Martin’s family’s attorney, Benjamin Crump. “It was Smathers’ car. [Kendle] shot [Smathers] twice, then shot Kijuan, and then Kijuan’s door opened, and he got out, shot, and then for whatever reason, the shooter then comes and shoots some more,” Crump said.

Smathers was taken to Jackson Memorial Hospital; according to his grandmother, he is in critical but stable condition.

Kendle is claiming Florida’s Stand Your Ground Law as his defense for the shooting. However, Byrd was unarmed at the time of the shooting, and his family is upset it took a week for police to arrest him. “We are here with another Stand Your Ground claim and another unarmed black man shot and killed,” Crump said.

Kendle has been arrested and charged with second-degree murder and attempted murder.

Management at Club Lexx has not commented on the shooting.

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Belmont Stakes odds: With I’ll Have Another Out, Dullahan new morning-line favorite

The field for Saturday’s 144th Belmont Stakes:

PP; Horse; Trainer; Jockey; Odds

1. Street Life; Chad Brown; Jose Lezcano; 8-1

2. Unstoppable U; Ken McPeek; Junior Alvarado; 20-1

3. Union Rags; Michael Matz; John Velazquez; 3-1

4. Atigun; Ken McPeek; Julien Leparoux; 15-1

5. Dullahan; Dale Romans; Javier Castellano; 9-5

6. Ravelo’s Boy; Manny Azpurua; Alex Solis; 30-1

7. Five Sixteen; Dominick Schettino; Rosie Napravnik; 30-1

8. Guyana Star Dweej; Doodnauth Shivmangal; Kent Desormeaux; 30-1

9. Paynter; Bob Baffert; Mike Smith; 7-2

10. Optimizer; D. Wayne Lukas; Corey Nakatani; 15-1

12. My Adonis; Kelly Breen; Ramon Dominguez; 15-1

Past Performances Here 

 

Rick Santorum predicts a convention fight with Ron Paul delegates over party platform

ROSEMONT, Ill. — Rick Santorum and Ron Paul have never gotten along, and while the primaries are effectively over, their intra-party rivalry could stretch on through the summer.

With 267 delegates pledged to him so far, Santorum is planning to flex his muscle at the Republican party convention in August, where he predicted Friday there could be a showdown over the party platform between the social conservative delegates who pledged support for him and Ron Paul’s libertarian supporters. Paul’s campaign predicts that about 200 delegates will attend the convention on his behalf.

Both want a piece of the party platform, but candidates agree on very little politically. Speaking to reporters here Friday at a conservative conference, Santorum said his supporters are ready for “a fight” in Tampa.

“I want to make sure that our delegates have an opportunity to come, many of these folks were great volunteers and workers for us and I want to make sure they have the opportunity to experience that convention, and we have other candidates who have delegates coming who, let’s put it this way, may have a different approach, particularly to the platform,” Santorum said. “Some of the other issues that are going to be discussed at the convention. I want to make sure that the folks who represent the values that I did during this campaign are also are able to come to that convention and have their voices heard. I certainly have encouraged everyone to support Governor Romney as I have, but there are a lot of other issues at the convention other than just voting for the nominee.”

Santorum added that he would spend the months before the August convention ensuring that his delegates are “armed and ready to engage the fight.”

Paul, a candidate who advocates for a non-interventionist foreign policy and drug decriminalization, recently told supporters his delegate count puts him “in a tremendous position to grow our movement and shape the future of the GOP.”

During the primaries, the two candidates spent plenty of time at each others’ throat: They sparred constantly during the debates on foreign policy, and even attacked each other personally on stage. During the February GOP debate in Mesa, Arizona, Ron Paul called Santorum “fake.”

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Racist American Republican Speech, Thanks To The (Republican Americans) Americans Booing Behind Him

 

Megachurch pastor Creflo Dollar charged with attacking his daughter

FAYETTEVILLE, Ga. — Creflo Dollar, founder and pastor of World Changers Church International, was arrested early Friday on charges of attacking his 15-year-old daughter.

Dollar was taken into custody at his Fayetteville home and charged with simple battery and cruelty to children.

According to the police report from the Fayette County Sheriff’s Office, Dollar’s daughter called police to say that her father attacked her after they argued about whether the daughter could attend a party.

The report says Dollar choked his daughter, then threw her to the ground, punched her and hit her with his shoe. The responding officer noticed a scratch on the daughter’s neck near her throat; the daughter said her father gave her the scratch during the fight.

When police interviewed Dollar, he said he tried to restrain his daughter when she “became very disrespectful” after he told her she couldn’t go to the party, according to the report. Dollar admitted to spanking his daughter and wrestling her to the floor, but said it was because she hit him.

Dollar was taken to the Fayette County Jail after his arrest. Fayette County Police spokesman Brent Rowan said Dollar had his first appearance in magistrate court Friday and posted $5,000 bond.

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Jamaican Drug-Trafficker Christopher “Dudus Coke Given 23-Year Prison Term

Christopher “Dudus” Coke, a Jamaican convicted of heading an international narcotics- trafficking ring since the early 1990s, was sentenced to 23 years in prison by a federal judge in New York.

Coke pleaded guilty in August to racketeering conspiracy and conspiracy to commit assault with a dangerous weapon in aid of racketeering. He was arrested by Jamaican authorities and was brought to the U.S. in June 2010. The arrest sparked civil unrest in Coke’s neighborhood, and some residents wrote to the court seeking leniency for him.

“I’m a good person and I’ve done a lot of good deeds,” Coke told U.S. District Judge Robert Patterson in Manhattan today. Patterson said Coke’s criminal conduct offset any good behavior he might have considered.

Prosecutors in the office of Manhattan U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara said that since the early 1990s, Coke led the “Presidential Click” or the “Shower Posse,” a criminal enterprise based in Kingston, Jamaica, known to have members in the U.S. and other countries.

Prosecutors said that since 1994, members of the Presidential Click were involved in drug trafficking in New York, Miami and Jamaica, distributing marijuana, cocaine and crack cocaine at Coke’s direction.
Sealed Charges

Coke was indicted in 2007 and the charges remained sealed until his arrest. He was accused of conspiring to distribute cocaine and marijuana and plotting to illegally traffic in firearms.

After Coke’s arrest, violence broke out as gang members and Coke’s supporters clashed with Jamaican security forces, resulting in the deaths of about 70 people. According to prosecutors, residents of Kingston’s Tivoli Gardens neighborhood sent a petition to the judge seeking leniency for Coke.

“Coke’s ability to provide financial support to members and institutions in the community is inextricably linked to his narcotics trafficking activity,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Jocelyn Strauber said in court papers. “There can be no dispute that narcotics trafficking activities also served as a source of funds for him, and thus for his charitable activities.”

The case is U.S. v. Coke, 07-cr-971, U.S. District Court, Southern District of New York

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FL: County elections chiefs to state: We won’t resume voter purge program

Despite the state’s decision to fight the feds over Florida’s noncitizen voter purge, elections supervisors say they won’t resume the progam.

Florida’s noncitizen voter purge looks like it’s all but over.

The 67 county elections supervisors — who have final say over voter purges —are not moving forward with the purge for now because nearly all of them don’t trust the accuracy of a list of nearly 2,700 potential noncitizens identified by the state’s elections office.The U.S. Department of Justice has ordered the state to stop the purge.

“We’re just not going to do this,” said Leon County’s elections supervisor, Ion Sancho, one of the most outspoken of his peers. “I’ve talked to many of the other supervisors and they agree. The list is bad. And this is illegal.”

So far, more than 500 have been identified as citizens and lawful voters on the voter rolls. About 40 people statewide have been identified as noncitizens. At least four might have voted and could be guilty of a third-degree felony.

The eligibility of about 2,000 have not been identified one way or the other.

Florida Secretary of State Ken Detzner says he hopes to get the supervisors to reverse course by working more closely with them. His effort has also inspired a noncitizen voter-purge movement in North Carolina, whose secretary of state Detzner plans to speak with on Friday. And while the Florida purge has halted, the fight between the state and the feds has just begun now that the Justice Department demanded last week that the state cease the purge due to two federal voting laws. Detzner said the U.S. government didn’t just get the law wrong, it’s harming the state’s efforts to remove ineligible voters by refusing to provide Florida access to a citizenship and immigration database maintained by the Department of Homeland Security.

“We need to do a better job,” Detzner acknowledged. But we can’t do a better job. And the reason is Homeland Security has pushed us back.”

Detzner, whose office has been requesting access to the database since October, has asked to sit down with Homeland Security to meet its demands and get access to the database. That way, the state could produce a more accurate and easy-to-check list for elections supervisors, he said. Without access to the federal database, the state matched its voter rolls with a Florida Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles database that contains some citizenship information gathered when someone gets a state-issued ID.

But that database isn’t updated when a person becomes a citizen. So many people became U.S. citizens and then lawfully registered to vote — but they can look like noncitizen voters when the elections department compares the motor-vehicle database against. To get around the problem, DHSMV has asked the federal government to give it updated citizenship information.

That would make Miami-Dade Election Supervisor Penelope Townsley feel more comfortable. She said in a written letter last week that she was concerned the list was unreliable and was “only as good as the last time the voter made contact with the Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles.”

Miami-Dade has determined that 514 people on the list are citizens. About 14 are noncitizens. At least two have voted and have had their names forwarded to the State Attorney’s Office for investigation.

Townsley faulted the state for producing a list of about 1,600 voters that had no backup information and that contained duplicate IDs and the names of already removed voters, including three dead people.

“I find the state’s Non-Citizens Match list to be unreliable and insufficient, on its own,” Townsley said.

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I’ll Have Another is out of Belmont Retired From Racing

Past Performaces Here

Update: Doug O’Neill joined the Dan Patrick Show to break news on Triple Crown hopeful I’ll Have Another.

“I’ll Have Another is officially out of the Belmont,” O’Neill said.

O’Neill talked about what a let-down it is. “It’s not tragic, but it’s a huge disappointment,” O’Neill said.

O’Neill said he looks fine. He said he will walk the horse in front of the media at his 1 p.m. ET press conference to show everyone that the horse is doing well. But he has the beginning of the injury and they can’t run him.

“We scanned his left front leg and he’s got the start of tendinitis going on in his front leg. He’s not 100 percent and we ain’t taking any chances,
O’Neill said. “It’s not tragic, but it’s a huge disappointment. I’m just so bummed for the horse, obviously, and then for the the whole team.”

O’neill said the immediate treatment will be “three months of a whole lot of nothing.”

“And then we can start back with him. But he’s valuable and I know he’s going to have tons of options with different breeding farms to have him stand somewhere. … I’d love to see him back in my barn in a few months but realistically he’ll probably he’ll probably be seeing a lot of beautiful mares and smoking a lot of cigarettes.”

Patrick asked O’Neill if I’ll Have Another has raced his last race. “If I had to wager … I would say yes,” O’Neill said.

UPDATE: O’Neill and owner J. Paul Reddam have called a press conference for 1 p.m. today. It is unclear what the subject matter will be.

BELMONT, N.Y. – Seeking to escape the clamor of dormitory style living in the security barn required for all 12 entrants in Saturday’s Belmont Stakes, trainer Doug O’Neill beat the rush and took Triple Crown contender I’ll Have Another to the track at 5:30 a.m. Friday for his gallop.

In a new measure this year, the New York Racing and Wagering Board required the entire Belmont Stakes field to move into the security barn by noon Wednesday.

Amid questions in racing about illegal performance enhancement, the board cited racing integrity. On the day I’ll Have Another moved to the new barn, he galloped at 8:45 a.m. That was advanced by more than three hours today.

“It’s been very hectic the last few days, so we thought we would take him out when it’s quieter,” O’Neill said in a statement released by the New York Racing Association.

“The detention barn (a.k.a. security barn) setup with all 12 horses going out at the same time has been a little bit hectic. The simple thing of just trying to find a place to bathe your horse has been kind of congested. We thought we would come out early, and it would be quieter.

“Hopefully he will be back resting in his stall when 8:30 rolls around and a lot of the hectic activity starts. We want to get him in the quietest frame of mind leading up to the biggest race of his life.”

Dale Romans, trainer of potential spoiler Dullahan, has been the most point blank critic of the security barn requirement. Horses at Triple Crown races typically stay in the barns of the choosing. Here this week, all entrants into the security barn are monitored and all treatments and feedings of the horses are logged.

“The barn is ridiculous,” Romans said Thursday.

“There’s too many horses in there doing the same things at the same times. There’s too many people in there. There’s three or four people for every horse, and everybody trying to walk in the afternoons and graze. It’s just ridiculous.

“They could have found such an easier way to accommodate the horses, and I don’t think anybody who set that barn up or made the rules was thinking about the horse.”

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Rand Paul endorses Mitt Romney

Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) has endorsed Mitt Romney’s presidential bid, throwing his weight behind the presumptive GOP nominee even as his father, Rep. Ron Paul (R-Texas), has yet to fully terminate his White House bid.

Rand Paul made the move in an appearance on Fox News Channel’s “Hannity.”

“Well, you know, my first choice had always been my father. … He is still my first pick,” Paul said, according to a rush transcript of the appearance. “But now that the nominating process is over, tonight, I am happy to announce I am supporting Governor Romney.”

In a statement, Romney said that he was “honored” to receive the endorsement of Paul, a freshman lawmaker and founding member of the Senate Tea Party Caucus who is believed to be mulling his own future bid for national office.

“Senator Paul has been a leading voice in the effort to scale back the size and reach of government and promote liberty,” Romney said. “Over the past three and half years, President Obama has made government more and more of a presence in our lives, and Americans can’t afford four more years of the same failed policies. As president, I will reform the federal government and make it smaller, simpler, and smarter.”

The endorsement lends Romney further tea-party backing as he solidifies his support among the GOP faithful.

And it comes as Paul’s father technically remains a candidate in the White House race, although Romney has already clinched the 1,144 delegates necessary to win the nomination.

The elder Paul announced last month that he would suspend his active campaign operation and instead continue his pursuit of delegates through the second- and third-round stages of the nominating process in the states.

While Ron Paul has twice fallen short of clinching the GOP nod, his campaign – which has drawn the enthusiastic support of libertarian-leaning Republicans as well as some anti-war Democrats — has been viewed in part as an effort to lay the groundwork for a potential bid by his son down the line.

And Ron Paul’s supporters remain intent on making a significant showing at this summer’s Republican National Convention in Tampa, although it remains unclear whether their plans for a “Paul Festival” will be given the green light by convention organizers.

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