JUSTICE DELAYED
Bob Waechter (second row, far left) watches the swearing in of new county commissioners on Nov. 20,
2012. Photo by Norman Schimmel
FORMER GOP CHIEF'S DAY IN COURT PUSHED BACK
By Cooper Levey-Baker
Associate Editor
The trial of a former Sarasota County GOP
chairman accused of a third-degree felony,
originally slated to begin next month, has been
pushed back to the fall because the Sheriff's
Office has not yet finished a forensic analysis
of computers seized during the investigation.
The jury trial of Bob Waechter, the head of the
Sarasota Republican Party from 2004 to 2006,
had been scheduled to begin Aug. 19, with a
pre-trial docket sounding penciled in for July
29. But Assistant State Attorney Brian Iten
and Waechter attorney Stephen Walker, citing "unexpected delays" in case preparation,
agreed to push the trial back to Oct. 21, with
a docket sounding now scheduled for Oct. 7.
explains to The Sarasota News Leader. He
says his office doesn't expect to pursue any
additional investigations before the trial begins, and that the October court date should
hold.
Walker did not respond to a phone call.
Waechter is facing a Criminal Use of Personal
Identification Information charge stemming
from a complaint lodged last year by Sarasota County Council of Neighborhood Associations President Lourdes Ramirez. Ramirez,
a likely Republican candidate for the County
Commission next year, went to authorities
after she received a note sent by Democratic congressional candidate Keith Fitzgerald's
"We're still waiting on the results of the foren- campaign, thanking her for donating $200 to
sic analysis of some of the computers," Iten the Fitzgerald effort in 2012.
