The man charged over the I-75 standoff in Lee County had his first court appearance from a hospital bed, and the judge set no bond
Ladavion King, the man the Florida Highway Patrol charged after the standoff that shut Interstate 75 in both directions near Alico Road on Wednesday, July 22, appeared in a Lee County court for the first time on Saturday, July 25. Layza Pinero Resto and Tyler Watkins reported the hearing for Gulf Coast News. WINK News also reported it.
King took part in the hearing over an iPad because he is still receiving treatment at a hospital, according to Gulf Coast News. The judge did not set a bond.
The booking came the day before. Gulf Coast News reported that King was booked into the Lee County Jail on Friday, July 24, after being hospitalized with serious injuries following the standoff. Relatives told the outlet earlier in the week that they had not been informed of his condition.
The charges the Florida Highway Patrol filed in Lee County concern the standoff itself. The agency listed four counts of attempted second-degree murder with a firearm, one count of discharging a firearm in public, one count of unlawful possession of a firearm by a felon, and one count of fleeing or attempting to elude a law enforcement officer. Troopers said King fled a traffic stop on southbound I-75 and was later found barricaded inside a truck, and that shots were fired before he was taken into custody with help from the Lee County Sheriff's Office. No law enforcement officers were hurt.
The death that preceded the pursuit is a separate matter in a different county. St. Petersburg police said a woman was killed in that city around noon on Wednesday, roughly two hours before the standoff began in Lee County. Gulf Coast News identified her as Natasha Moses, 47, a mother of four, and reported that a family member said she and King had been together for five or six years. Her brother, Theron Musgrove, told the outlet that he had seen King earlier that morning and had noticed what he described as strange behavior. That investigation is being handled by the St. Petersburg Police Department, and the charges filed so far in Lee County do not include one for the death.
No court docket entry or booking record for the Saturday hearing was reachable at a stable public address at the time of publication, so this brief credits Gulf Coast News and WINK News for the reporting and attributes each factual claim to the authority that made it. The charges are allegations. King has not entered a plea, has not been convicted of any offense, and the account connecting him to the St. Petersburg death is one that police and relatives have described rather than one a court has decided.
Where we read it: Layza Pinero Resto and Tyler Watkins at Gulf Coast News. Read their story.
The document: No public filing has been released.