PORT ST. LUCIE — Police Chief Donald Shinnamon has decided not to make the parents of two boys who made a bogus report of a girl being abducted Wednesday morning pay the costs of the massive effort to find the non-existent girl.

Tom Nichols, the Port St. Lucie Police Department public information officer, confirmed the decision but declined to explain Shinnamon’s reasoning. (more…)

INDIAN RIVER COUNTY — Authorities Tuesday filed charges against a man who allegedly punched and killed a 6-pound dog earlier this month.

Justin Dabelow, 23, of the 1300 block of 16th Court Southwest, Vero Beach, posted $7,000 bail Wednesday at the Indian River County Jail. He was charged with cruelty to animals, disposal of bodies of dead animals and abandonment of an animal.

Dabelow told the Indian River County Sheriff’s Office on Nov. 7 he was at his home and removing his girlfriend’s Yorkshire terrier from its crate when it bit him on his hand. He punched the dog and it went unconscious.

Later, he and his girlfriend checked on the dog and found it was dead, according to an incident report. Dabelow took the dog’s body and tossed it into the woods behind his home, the report states.

By Lamaur Stancil, TCPalm.com

FORT PIERCE — A man suspected of being the “Red Striped Bandit” was arrested following a Monday armed robbery and is thought to be involved in a series of similar crimes stretching back to 2007, according to an affidavit released Tuesday by police.

Cedrick T. Beckwith, 26, of the 800 block of Georgia Avenue, faces a robbery with firearm charge in connection with the Monday evening incident at the Ramallah Food Market in the 3000 block of Orange Avenue. (more…)

PORT ST. LUCIE — A 44-year-old man who threw darts at patrons of Mickey Finns bar and returned to the establishment after being kicked out was arrested, according to a recently released affidavit.

The bartender “cut off” serving drinks to Scott D. Leonard, of the 100 block of Southeast Todd Avenue, late Sunday or early Monday “due to Mr. Leonard’s behavior as he was throwing darts at other patrons.” (more…)

FORT PIERCE — About $200,000 worth of marijuana was seized Thursday during a grow house bust by the Fort Pierce Police Department and the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency, according to a police news release.

Police with the DEA arrested and charged Michael Philip Carty, 44, and his wife, Tiffany Dawn Carty, 32, both of the 1100 block of Granada Avenue, with cultivation of marijuana, possession of marijuana with the intent to sell and possession of drug paraphernalia. As of Thursday evening, both were in St. Lucie County Jail in lieu of $10,500 bail. (more…)

INDIAN RIVER COUNTY — School officials said a 14-year-old student broke into Storm Grove Middle School, damaging doors and surfing the Internet for pornography, according to a juvenile arrest affidavit.

Security cameras at the school captured images of the eighth-grade student crawling under a gate to get inside the campus last weekend, a deputy for the Indian River County Sheriff’s Office said. More cameras caught him going into the custodian’s office, where he looked at porn Web sites for an hour, the affidavit said. The student also caused $1,200 damage to an office door, the Sheriff’s Office said. (more…)

FORT PIERCE — A local man was arrested after fleeing a deputy and bailing out of a Buick in which about 50 rocks of crack cocaine were found, according to an affidavit released Wednesday.

Eliezer Geneus, 22, faces charges including cocaine possession with intent to sell, driving while license suspended habitual offender and obstruction without violence following the Tuesday incident. (more…)

MARTIN COUNTY — Two Port St. Lucie parents were charged with child neglect after shoppers noticed their 7-month-old girl had been left alone in an unlocked car for half an hour Monday, the Martin County Sheriff’s Office said.

Monica Alastra, 33, and Walter Lugo, 32, were taken into custody after they had been shopping at a fabric store in the 3500 block of Southwest Federal Way, Jensen Beach. They each posted $5,000 bail Monday.

Someone called 911 shortly after 7 p.m. when they noticed the infant was in the Toyota minivan in the store parking lot, the Sheriff’s Office said. Deputy Lynn Martella said she found the parents inside the store with a 3-year-old child.

“They seemed relatively calm. They saw that I was holding their child and they were looking at me and they wanted to know, could they have their baby and I said no,” the deputy said. “I said, ‘You understand you’re both going to be placed under arrest,’ and that is when they became upset.”

The infant in the minivan was sweaty and agitated, but did not require medical attention, the deputy said. The Department of Children and Families gave both children to another family member, the Sheriff’s Office said.

Alastra and Lugo told the deputy they had used poor judgment, according to a Sheriff’s Office news release.

WPTV Channel 5 contributed to this report.

Lamaur Stancil, TCPalm.com

PORT ST. LUCIE — A 36-year-old woman was arrested Wednesday after selling an informant nearly 160 oxycodone pills, according to an affidavit released Thursday.

Gina M. Sanchez, of the 100 block of Everglades Boulevard in Stuart, met the informant about 4:30 p.m. Wednesday in the 200 block of Southwest Port St. Lucie Boulevard.

The informant, who met earlier with a police investigator, had been given $1,020 and had been followed to the scene by members of the police department’s Special Investigations Unit.

The informant got into Sanchez’s vehicle, and Sanchez exchanged 157 oxycodone pills for the money.

Police arrested Sanchez on a felony trafficking in oxycodone charge and took her to jail.

Will Greenlee, TCPalm.com

FORT PIERCE — A man accused of stealing dozens of frozen meals, candy bars, bathroom tissue, tea and other items from a Dollar Tree store was arrested after secreting himself in an attic, according to a police report released Tuesday.

About 8:40 p.m. Monday, police responded to an address in the 800 block of Sunrise Boulevard where a woman in the area said a man approached her and asked whether she wanted to purchase some frozen foods. The woman said the man’s name was “Tom” and that he lived in a nearby apartment. (more…)