June 9, 2023
OCALA, Fla. (AP) — A judge granted a $154,000 bond Friday for a white Florida woman charged with fatally shooting a Black neighbor through her front door.
Susan Louise Lorincz, 58, of Ocala returned to court in Marion County a day after she pleaded not guilty to a first-degree felony charge of manslaughter with a firearm, as well as counts of culpable negligence, battery and assault.
As a condition of her bond, Circuit Court Judge Robert Hodges ordered Lorincz to wear an ankle monitor and to stay away from the family of her slain neighbor, 34-year-old Ajike Owens.
The courtroom was packed with relatives and supporters of Owens, a mother of four children. One of the family’s attorneys, Anthony Thomas, told reporters after the Friday hearing that they would continue to push for Lorincz to face a more serious charge of second-degree murder.
“We don’t believe that Susan had any sort of respect at all for human life,” Thomas said. “This wasn’t something where she was cleaning a gun and the gun went off and it goes through the wall or the door and it accidentally hurts somebody. She meant to pull that trigger. She meant to point it at the door.”
Owens was killed June 2 in Ocala, about 83 miles (133 kilometers) north of Orlando. Her funeral is scheduled for Monday.
After the shooting, Lorincz told investigators she had problems for two years with being disrespected by children in the neighborhood — including Owens’ children, who are ages 12, 9, 7 and 3.
According to an arrest report from the Marion County Sheriff’s Office, Lorincz said she had a headache the day of the shooting and children were running, and yelling outside her apartment. That night, while a few children were playing basketball, Lorincz threw a pair of roller skates at them, hitting one on the feet.
Owens then came over and knocked on her door. Lorincz told investigators that Owens threatened to kill her and banged on the door so hard she feared Owens would break it down.
Lorincz fired a single round from her .380-caliber handgun, the sheriff’s report says, which went through the closed door and fatally struck Owens.
Lorincz told investigators that she had called Owens’ children racist slurs in the months before the killing. Authorities had delayed her arrest for several days while looking into a possible “ stand your ground ” claim. Detectives have since said that Lorincz’s actions are not justifiable under Florida law.
Sheriff Billy Woods said that since January 2021, deputies responded to at least a half-dozen complaints between Owens and Lorincz in Ocala.
This article was published by the Associated Press.
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