Two men from Southwest Florida and members of the Proud Boys organization have pleaded guilty to felony charges stemming from their conduct during the Jan. 6, 2021, breach of the U.S. Capitol. Tom Vournas, 63, of Bradenton, pleaded guilty today to a felony charge of assaulting, resisting, or impeding certain officers using a dangerous weapon and inflicting bodily injury. Leonard Lobianco, 53, of North Port, , pleaded guilty on Sept. 23, to a felony charge of civil disorder.

Embattled Lee County Sheriff Carmine Marceno has been captured in video recordings accepting a stack of cash from the same “ghost employee” who has claimed the two men were involved in a kickback scheme involving sheriff’s office funds paid to Marceno’s father.The video shows Marceno receiving what appears to be a thick stack of hundred-dollar bills from jeweler Ken Romano, who is said to be cooperating in an FBI investigation of the sheriff.

Lee County Sheriff Carmine Marceno put Ken Romano on the public payroll as a consultant in 2022 at $5,700 a month to provide “guidance regarding public relations” and social media at the agency. The consulting agreement, released by LCSO today, claimed the 55-year-old Romano possessed the “ability, certifications and experience” to do the job and was “duly qualified.”But Romano isn’t a public relations or social media expert. He’s a Bonita Springs jeweler and former Marceno gambling buddy who said in a recently surfaced audio recording that his LCSO consulting job was a no-work sham and a portion of the money — $1,700 a month — was used to pay for a Mercedes Benz the sheriff bought for his father, Carmine Marceno Sr.

The Matanzas Pass Bridge was closed Monday morning after a shrimp boat struck a portion of the bottom of the span.The same boat hit the bridge again Tuesday morning.

Bonita Springs jeweler Ken Romano didn’t hide his association with Lee County Sheriff Carmine Marceno.The two men were allegedly close friends who shared a taste for gambling, bling and high-end cars. The 55-year-old Romano defended the sheriff in social media posts and displayed a framed “Keep Carmine Marceno Sheriff” campaign poster and badge-bedecked plaque from the sheriff’s office at his jewelry store on Bonita Beach Road.But the friendship blew up recently, and audio recordings allegedly show Romano making serious allegations against the sheriff involving Romano’s own employment as a “consultant” with LCSO. In the recordings, Romano alleged Marceno gave him a no-work contract at LCSO paying him $5,700 a month, $1,700 of which was paid to the sheriff’s father, Carmine Marceno Sr., for car payments on a Mercedes Benz.

A Collier County man missing for more than a week has been confirmed dead, the Collier County Sheriff's Office said Sunday.Posting on the agency's Facebook site, the Sheriff's Office said that a body tentatively identified as that of Eduardo Ramirez was located by members of the Florida Fish and Wildlife Commission on Saturday a short distance south of the 97 Mile Marker in the Picayune Strand.

In secretive hearings, the University of Florida set aside recommendations to lightly punish some of the college students arrested after pro-Palestinian protests on campus and kicked them all out of school for three to four years.The decisions by the new dean of students, Chris Summerlin, overruled what were effectively sentencing recommendations by the juries, known as hearing bodies, who heard testimony and watched police video of the protests and arrests during the disciplinary cases.

According to Florida Power & Light, a power outage related to the Corkscrew substation is affecting more than 3,000 users, including FGCU’s campus buildings and residential halls.

The container ship that caused the deadly collapse of Baltimore’s Francis Scott Key Bridge was refloated Monday and has begun slowly moving back to port.The Dali has remained at the collapse site since it lost power and crashed into one of the bridge’s supporting columns on March 26, killing six construction workers and snarling traffic into Baltimore Harbor.

While Moms For Liberty cofounder Bridget Ziegler and her husband, former Florida GOP chair Christian Ziegler, fight in court today to keep law enforcement records related to the latter’s closed rape investigation from public view, a recently released police report provides startling details about the couple’s sexual practices. The report, obtained by the Florida Trident and authored by Sarasota police Det. Angela Cox, recounts how Christian Ziegler went “on the prowl” in bars for women to bring home to Bridget, a Sarasota County School Board member who has backed a number of anti-LGBTQ measures at both the state and local level, for threesome encounters.