Florida

MIAMI, FL — A federal jury has convicted 59-year-old Ryan Wesley Routh of Hawaii for attempting to assassinate then-former President Donald J. Trump in a planned sniper attack at Trump International Golf Club in West Palm Beach. According to trial evidence, Routh had concealed himself in a sniper’s hide near the golf course with an SKS-style rifle equipped with a scope and loaded magazine, aimed toward the sixth hole green. He was spotted by a U.S. Secret Service special agent patrolling near the president, who opened fire in response. Routh fled the scene but was later apprehended on I-95 by Martin County Sheriff’s deputies, with assistance from Palm Beach County deputies. In Routh’s vehicle, investigators found multiple cellphones, a list of outbound flights from Miami Internat...

ATLANTA, GA – The United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit has affirmed the district court’s entry of summary judgment in favor of GEICO Casualty Insurance Company in a bad faith lawsuit brought by Katherine Martinez. The panel, consisting of Circuit Judges Luck, Lagoa, and Abudu, held that no reasonable jury could find GEICO acted in bad faith under Florida law based on the evidence presented. Martinez was severely injured in a three-vehicle crash in Miami-Dade County on February 12, 2009. The crash occurred when a pickup truck driven by Rene Carranza rear-ended the SUV in which Martinez was a passenger, causing it to spin into the path of a northbound truck driven by Diana Guevara. Guevara was insured by GEICO with a bodily injury policy limit of $10,000 per person ...

TAMPA, FL, - Robert Desselle, 47, was sentenced Friday to 57 months in federal prison for conspiracy to defraud the United States and to pay and receive health care kickbacks, according to the Department of Justice. In addition to the prison sentence, Desselle was ordered to pay $4.5 million in restitution and forfeit $2.1 million in criminal proceeds. Desselle pleaded guilty in February 2025. According to court documents, from June 2018 to December 2020, Desselle and his co-conspirators targeted vulnerable Medicare beneficiaries by convincing them to take unnecessary genetic tests. He paid non-medical recruiters to approach beneficiaries at places such as grocery stores, pharmacies, and car dealerships using deceptive tactics. Desselle then paid bribes to a telemedicine company...

According to court documents filed in U.S. District Court in Miami, Dennis Dopico, of Miami, served as a vice president for a company operating a seafood processing center that sold stone crab claws and spiny lobsters. Between 2023 and 2025, Dopico and competitors conspired to suppress competition by fixing the prices paid to fishermen, thereby artificially depressing the income earned by Florida fishermen for their harvests. “Criminal conspiracies to deprive hardworking Americans the right to earn a fair wage are untenable in a free society,” said Acting Deputy Assistant Attorney General Omeed Assefi of the Justice Department’s Antitrust Division. “The Antitrust Division and its law enforcement partners will work tirelessly to ensure that hardworking Americans are paid competitively fo...

MIAMI, FL – A federal indictment unsealed Friday charges Kenneth Charles Kessler III, 42, of Miami-Dade County, and Michael Andrew Gomez, 42, of Broward County, for their roles in a large-scale Medicare fraud scheme involving the submission of approximately $34.8 million in false claims for medically unnecessary equipment. According to court documents, the two men operated seven Florida-based durable medical equipment (DME) companies and used deceptive telemarketing to persuade thousands of Medicare beneficiaries to accept items they did not need, including orthotic braces and continuous glucose monitors. Kessler and Gomez are accused of paying illegal kickbacks to marketing companies that obtained beneficiaries' personal information and coordinated with telemedicine providers to...

JACKSONVILLE, FL – A 24-year-old man has been charged with murder following the death of his girlfriend’s father, who was shot during a domestic disturbance last month. According to the Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office, Dontay Taylor was initially arrested on August 25 for Attempted Murder and Possession of a Firearm by a Convicted Felon after a shooting that occurred on August 7 in the area of Ahmad Drive near West 45th Street. Officers responding to the scene found 50-year-old Derrick Griffin with multiple gunshot wounds. He was transported by JFRD to the hospital in critical condition. Detectives from the Robbery and Violent Crimes Unit determined that Taylor was in a relationship with Griffin’s daughter and that the two had been in a physical altercation. When Griffin attempted ...

MIAMI, FL – A federal jury has convicted Carl Alan Zaglin, 70, of Marietta, Georgia, for orchestrating a nearly five-year-long scheme to bribe Honduran government officials and launder money to secure contracts worth over $10 million for his Georgia-based company, Atlanco LLC. According to court documents and trial evidence, Zaglin, owner and CEO of Atlanco, paid hundreds of thousands of dollars in bribes to officials with the Comité Técnico del Fideicomiso para la Administración del Fondo de Protección y Seguridad Poblacional (TASA), a Honduran government entity responsible for procuring goods for the Honduran National Police. Zaglin authorized payments through a third-party intermediary, Aldo Nestor Marchena of Boca Raton, Florida, who received $2.5 million in funds under sham ...

JACKSONVILLE, FL – A 14-year-old has been arrested in the fatal shooting of an 18-year-old on Jacksonville’s Westside, according to the Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office. Police said officers found Marlon Lane, 18, with multiple gunshot wounds September 10 at an apartment complex on Labelle Street. He was taken to a hospital, where he was pronounced deceased. Detectives identified 14-year-old Keyon Byrd as the suspect. He turned himself in September 12, the same day a warrant was issued for his arrest. Byrd has been charged with murder and remains in custody.

MIAMI, FL – A federal grand jury in Miami has indicted Joseph Stewart of Miami for tax evasion and filing false tax returns related to millions in income he allegedly earned from selling internet access to American servicemembers and contractors stationed overseas. According to the indictment, from 2013 to 2021, Stewart earned over $6.8 million in dividends from his 50% ownership in a business serving U.S. personnel abroad. While he filed tax returns before the business became profitable, he allegedly stopped filing timely returns once he began receiving significant dividend income. After receiving IRS correspondence in 2019, Stewart allegedly hired a tax attorney and return preparers but misrepresented that more than $3.8 million in dividends received between 2013 and 2018 were ...

MIAMI, FL – A dual United Kingdom–Nigerian national, Iheanyichukwu Jonathan Abraham, 44, has been sentenced to 90 months in prison for his role in a transnational inheritance fraud scheme targeting elderly victims in the United States. According to court documents, Abraham and his co-conspirators sent personalized letters to elderly U.S. residents falsely claiming they were entitled to multimillion-dollar inheritances from deceased relatives in Portugal. Victims were instructed to send payments for fake delivery fees and taxes to claim their inheritance. Abraham helped operate a complex network that laundered the fraud proceeds through former victims in the United States, who were manipulated into receiving and forwarding money to others involved in the scheme. Abraham was ext...