Florida Lawyer Common James Uthmeier as soon as once more set his sights on Orange-Osceola State Lawyer Monique Worrell on Monday, this time to demand she drop the case in opposition to a girl charged with killing a person in a highway rage taking pictures or probably face “additional intervention.”
Worrell, who has been below rising state scrutiny since profitable again the workplace Gov. Ron DeSantis had eliminated her from a yr earlier, responded that the case “is a matter for judicial willpower, not partisan politics.”
At query is the case in opposition to Tina Allgeo, 48, who was indicted by a grand jury in January for homicide and aggravated battery with a lethal weapon within the Dec. 2 killing of 42-year-old Mihail Tsvetkov.
Allgeo encountered Tsvetkov as they drove alongside East Colonial Drive close to Primrose Avenue, east of downtown Orlando. In line with stories by the Orlando Police Division, the 2 quarreled as Tsvetkov drove intently behind Allgeo, at one level putting her automobile after which her throughout an try to flee after she acquired out to survey the harm to her rear bumper.
It additional escalated when Allgeo side-swiped his automobile — by accident, she advised police in a written assertion — as she adopted him to get a more in-depth have a look at his license plate. Video surveillance then confirmed Tsvetkov exit his automobile, open her driver’s aspect door and punch her repeatedly whereas attempting to tug her out her car earlier than she shot him within the face. She was later launched after a choose discovered prosecutors failed to ascertain “the proof is obvious” that she dedicated homicide.
On Aug. 15, her lawyer, Mark O’Mara, filed a movement to dismiss the fees, arguing she adopted Florida’s “Stand Your Floor” legislation that enables individuals to defend themselves with lethal power and not using a responsibility to retreat. A listening to to resolve whether or not to drop Allgeo’s case is scheduled for Oct. 30.
However then, Uthmeier entered the fray.
“We’re calling on State Lawyer Worrell — repair this, proper this unsuitable. Right here within the AG’s workplace, we’ll stand sturdy for individuals who rightly interact in self-defense,” Uthmeier mentioned in a video posted to his X account. The demand was adopted by a letter to her workplace, dated Monday, insisting “she ought to be immune from felony prosecution” and famous {that a} conviction “might very seemingly require my workplace to confess plain error on attraction.”
It additionally got here with a stern warning: “Your actions seemingly represent a breach of your moral obligations. They usually can also represent misfeasance, malfeasance, neglect of responsibility and incompetence. I strongly urge you to rethink your prosecution of Allgeo. And my workplace will consider whether or not additional intervention is warranted.”
It’s not clear how Allgeo’s case was delivered to Uthmeier’s consideration. O’Mara, famed for efficiently representing George Zimmerman for the killing of Trayvon Martin, denied flagging the case to the legal professional normal however declined to remark additional on the matter.
Two hours after Uthmeier’s remarks had been posted on-line, Worrell issued a press release of her personal saying she used her discretion as a prosecutor to carry the case to a grand jury, and that the choice as as to if “Stand Your Floor” applies to Allgeo is as much as a choose.
“Prosecutors don’t function extensions of the Governor or the Lawyer Common; we serve the individuals of our circuit in accordance with Florida legislation,” Worrell states. “The Lawyer Common’s makes an attempt to intimidate or override unbiased prosecutorial judgment erode public belief within the neutral administration of justice.”
Whereas the general public spats between Uthmeier and Worrell have been a staple since Worrell was reelected as state legal professional, Monday’s trade was the primary to see the legal professional normal overtly threaten her removing.
His accusation that her choice to prosecute Allgeo is a breach of moral obligations echoes the language utilized in 2023, when Gov. Ron DeSantis eliminated her following complaints by legislation enforcement leaders that she wasn’t aggressively pursuing convictions for sure crimes — together with drug trafficking circumstances introduced by the Osceola County Sheriff’s Workplace, which a Sentinel evaluation discovered to be doubtful.
That yr, DeSantis changed Worrell with Orange County Decide Andrew Bain, who returned the bench after shedding to her in final yr’s election. Issues that the governor would take away her once more, nonetheless, have haunted Worrell’s return to workplace starting with a grand jury probe forward of her inauguration, the circumstances surrounding which are actually the topic of a lawsuit.
This yr, Uthmeier has primarily attacked Worrell over a coverage addressing circumstances through which suspects weren’t instantly arrested earlier than sending prosecutors to help her workplace in clearing an enormous backlog. Final week, DeSantis took intention at her document of prosecuting accused fentanyl traffickers, to which she responded by citing 100 drug trafficking convictions her workplace obtained since January, with 29 being defendants accused of trafficking the infamous opioid.
Worrell has repeatedly disregarded fears of being faraway from workplace once more, telling reporters final week, “I’m involved with doing my job, the job that I used to be elected to do and I do it each single day.”
In a quarterly replace in April, Worrell mentioned highway rage shootings, just like the one for which Allgeo faces a homicide cost, had been a “nice concern” being tackled by her administration. The homicide conviction in opposition to Nicholas Carrasquillo, sentenced to 50 years in jail for a 2024 taking pictures that occurred a mile away from the place Tsvetkov was killed the identical yr, was cited for instance of her workplace’s dogged prosecution of such circumstances. When Allgeo was indicted, she mentioned shootings “stemming from mindless disputes won’t be tolerated.”
An evaluation by Everytown for Gun Security, which advocates for stricter gun legal guidelines, confirmed highway rages have elevated practically yearly between 2018 and 2023, with a slight drop-off within the latter yr. In 2024, Florida was second solely to Texas in complete highway rage incidents across the nation, with 36 such incidents ensuing 12 individuals being killed, based on Gun Violence Archive information compiled and supplied by the Gun Violence Knowledge Hub.