Jason Nordstrom

Jason Nordstrom’s wife reportedly had been at Bair’s rented residence in the 2500 block of Southeast Monroe Street earlier and told Bair her husband had been abusing her.

Alanna Nordstrom left Bair’s home and went across the street to a neighbor’s house where her husband was, Martin County Sheriff’s Office Sgt. Michael Dougherty said Friday. Alanna Nordstrom reportedly told her husband that Bair. 42, called 911, which in reality Bair had not, Dougherty said.

Dean W. Bair

“Up to this point, we haven’t found anything that says that it’s an unlawful killing,” Dougherty said.

Dougherty said the Nordstroms reportedly have been separated for about a year, with Jason Nordstrom living in the Keys. He reportedly was in the area to buy school clothes for his 8-year-old child.

Witnesses said the couple fought earlier in the day, and Alanna Nordstrom told investigators he hadn’t physically harmed her, but she was concerned.

“He was throwing brick pavers in the back yard … picked a hammock up, threw it in the pool,” Dougherty said.
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It takes eight members of an animal hospital's staff to hold the python, caught on Wednesday. (Courtesy of Okeechobee Veterinary Hospital.)

“He’s been sighted by residents many times for the last couple of years,” Jennifer Van Buren said of the 17-foot-2-inch Burmese python that was killed Thursday behind the Okeechobee Veterinary Hospital, just outside the city.

The snake measured 26 inches in circumference and weighed 200 pounds when its carcass was pulled out of a canal behind the animal hospital, the state Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission reported.

A hospital veterinarian, identified by commission officials as Jim Harvey, shot the python.
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By the end of 2007, St. Lucie County jail officials were celebrating the successes of working with a shrinking jail population due in part, they said, to efforts to remedy an overcrowding problem that had been the subject of a lawsuit from the public defender’s office.

St. Lucie Sheriff Ken Mascara during a news conference at the time called the jail a success story.

But in that same year, a Stuart attorney is alleging in two lawsuits filed in July, the prison’s medical services were so wrought with inefficiency and “bean-counting” that they kept two men from finding medical remedies for eye problems that eventually left one of them blind in his left eye and forced the other to have an eye removed altogether.

“When these facilities have someone in custody they have a custodial duty to them, regardless of their station in life,” Laurence Huttman, the Stuart attorney representing the men, said Thursday. “I’m not talking about cable TV or cellphones or other luxuries, just basic custodial care.”

Huttman is suing the jail and its medical provider, Prison Health Systems, as well as a doctor, nurse practitioner and Mascara on behalf of former inmates Victor Carter and Stanley Beale.

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A creative technology investment company planning to build a digital production studio in Port St. Lucie already is recruiting a senior management team and will soon start a second phase of recruiting for other positions.

The second-phase positions will be focused on development, storytelling, animation and production.

The company plans to build a digital production studio in Port St. Lucie that could bring at least 500 jobs and a $50 million capital investment to a county struggling with a 14.1 percent jobless rate.

Hobe Sound-based Wyndcrest Holdings LLC — which focuses on entertainment, telecommunications and Internet technology — announced Thursday its plans for a 150,000-square-foot facility that will include artist studios, office suites, screening theaters, software design studios and community access areas. (more…)

FORT PIERCE — Some city commissioners are questioning why city manager David Recor didn’t include a job he held in Alaska on his resume and city application when he applied for deputy city manager in Fort Pierce.

But Recor said issues surrounding his Alaska job are misunderstandings.

Recor worked as a planning and land-use director for Matanuska-Susitna Borough, AK, from March 12, 2003, to April 14, 2003, according to Borough’s Human Resources Manager Rob McFerron. Recor was hired as Fort Pierce deputy city manager in April 2005 by former city manager Dennis Beach. Recor was then promoted to city manager in October when Beach retired.

Three days before Recor resigned from his job in Alaska, the Palmer Police Department arrested and charged him with shoplifting. The charges were later dropped and the case was dismissed, court records show. (more…)

MARTIN COUNTY — Defending themselves from election violation accusations, business struggles, market declines and a growing reliance upon credit cards were in part responsible for four of the five county commissioners reporting decreases in net worth over the past year.

The exception was Commissioner Sarah Heard. She shaved nearly $20,000 off her mortgage and reported increases in the value of her Rocky Point home and land she owns in Dixie County and a retirement account. She reported her income grew by more than $40,000 to $707,678. (more…)

ST. LUCIE COUNTY — Four of the five commissioners who oversee the county’s $587 million budget suffered personal declines in their net worth last year.

Commission Chairwoman Paula Lewis, on the board since 1996, was the only one to record an increase, growing nearly $20,000, even as her home dipped in value by $10,000 and liabilities grew by $3,000.

The largest drop was recorded by Commissioner Chris Dzadovsky, who was elected to the board in 2008. He saw his net worth down nearly $200,000 from the prior year, with real estate being the biggest reason. His two residential properties in Fort Pierce lost a combined $185,063 in value from 2007 to 2008. (more…)

The early retirement of state Sen. Ken Pruitt will cost local governments — and therefore taxpayers — more than $475,000.

Tuesday’s special election to replace Pruitt, R-Port St. Lucie, for one year will cost at least that much.

Elections officials in the five counties that comprise state Senate District 28 base their costs projections upon printing, staff overtime, poll worker costs, advertising and the cost to mail out absentee-style ballots. (more…)

HOBE SOUND — Before Harrison Ford donned a brown leather hat and whip, Kenneth E. Douglas’s two sons knew their father as the real-life Indiana Jones.

But Douglas, who was befriended by a rocket scientist, served as a police chief in tribal Liberia and had his plane attacked by a South American anaconda, was more than just a thrill-seeker.

Douglas also had the amicable Forrest Gump-like knack for running into and befriending some of the world’s most influential people across all walks of life. (more…)

FORT PIERCE — Police arrested a 47-year-old man after he allegedly snatched an 11-year-old boy’s basketball and football and chased the boy and his sister with a shovel, according to recently released records.

Roger H. Willis reportedly has been dating the grandmother of the 11-year-old boy and his 21-year-old sister, the sister told police Wednesday.

The siblings were visiting the grandmother’s house and the 11-year-old boy played outside with the football and basketball, the sister said. (more…)