Court shorts

Riley Attridge

Riley Attridge, who faces a murder charge for the shooting death of Preston Gage Pitman at a graduation party in 2018, was set for trial in March, but Wakulla Chief Prosecutor Jon Fuchs asked the case be heard in September to give him more time to depose the defense’s experts.
At a hearing on Feb. 9, Wakulla Circuit Judge Layne Smith set the cash for docket sounding on Sept. 6 with jury selection on Sept. 18.
According to police reports, Attridge and Pitman had exchanged  social media messages about a girl.
Attridge, who was 20 at the time of the shooting, also faces charges of carrying a concealed firearm, possession of more than 20 grams of marijuana and paraphernalia.
Attridge is represented by Tallahassee attorney Tim Jansen. It appears that the defense will argue that Attridge acted in self-defense.
Attridge reportedly said he knew Pitman intended to confront him at the party held at St. Marks Rise after graduation and so armed himself with a .22 handgun.
Attridge reportedly pulled the .22 and shot Pitman. Other partygoers disarmed Attridge and reportedly beat him.
Because of where St. Marks Rise is located, there was initially confusion among law enforcement responding to 911 calls – deputies from Leon County answered the call then determined it was a Wakulla case.
In other court cases:
• A man facing trial on charges of armed burglary of a dwelling with a firearm discharged, a first-degree felony punishable by life in prison, took a plea to aggravated battery with a firearm discharged, a second degree felony, and was sentenced to nine months in the Wakulla County Jail with credit for 36 days time considered served, followed by 24 months of community control, plus court costs and fines.
Nick Roberts, 52, was set to go to trial on Monday, Feb. 20, with jurors standing by when the plea deal was reached.
Roberts was arrested in June 2021 after he shot another man in the leg in a trailer where he had formerly lived with a woman, Tammy Vaillancourt.
Roberts had left the home about two weeks earlier after he and Vaillancourt had argued. She told deputies that, a day earlier, Roberts had texted her that he intended to knock her teeth out. She said she invited Jarred Harrison into the home so that she would have some protection.
Roberts showed up at the home in the middle of the night and she confronted him in the front yard. He left but came back. He called her and told her to take her 11-year-old son and leave the house. She later told deputies she was terrified that something sinister was about to happen, so she started to leave with Harrison behind her. Seeing Roberts, Harrison retreated into the house.
Roberts opened the door with a firearm in his hand, looking for Harrison, who bullrushed him. Roberts told deputies he intended to fire into the ground but hit Harrison in the leg.
When deputies arrived on the scene, they found Roberts in the front yard holding a handgun. He was ordered to drop the weapon and get down on the ground. He did, and told deputies he had a second gun, a Derringer, in his pocket.
Harrison was found inside the trailer sitting against a wall bleeding from the leg wound in obvious agony.
• Christopher Rodgers was sentenced to a year and a day in prison after being arrested nine times for driving while license suspended or revoked (DWLSR).
“Driving infractions typically don’t invoke jail terms, but that’s typically one or two times,” Judge Smith told Rodgers. “Not nine times.”
Rodgers had entered a plea on his eighth charge of DWLSR habitual offender and been sentenced to probation when he was stopped two days later driving without a license.
At a hearing on Feb. 8, Rodgers entered a straight-up plea to DWLSR plus the violation of probation for the new offense.
Assistant Public Defender Matt Ream, who represented Rodgers, noted his client had the chance to do plumbing work in Panama City at a complex being developed, and asked for leniency.
Fuchs asked the court to sentence Rodgers to 24 months in state prison, saying Rodgers is “unable to follow the law or unwilling to.”
Judge Smith took a break and then returned to the courtroom to pronounce sentence.
“At some point there has to be consequences,” Smith said.