Lyons vs. Atkins, Round 2
June 6th, 2007 by max linsky in Politics
(Someday we’ll get tired of running this photo. Someday.)
As we said yesterday, we liked Tom Lyons’ column on the Bart situation. Shelin’s point — that the issue is not about the accusation but about Bart’s non-disclosure — has some resonance, but we agree with Lyons: we’re not sure what you do if someone accuses you of something horrible, and they’re found to be wrong.
But as Lyons pointed out, Commissioner Fredd Atkins does. From the April 1, 2004 edition of the HT:
Prosecutors won’t press battery charges against Sarasota City Commissioner Fredd Atkins, saying there’s no indication he did anything illegal by pulling a pregnant woman away from his car.
State law allows a person to use “reasonable force” to “eject a trespasser,” said assistant state attorney W. Earl Varn.
“In this particular case, there was no way to prove that the force that was used was anything other than reasonable,” he said.
Atkins, 51, said Wednesday he’s pleased with prosecutors’ decision. He said he did nothing wrong and doesn’t understand how “something as innocent as what happened” could escalate into a criminal complaint.
“I wish it never happened,” he said.
Of anyone at that table, Atkins should understand what a precarious situation Bart was/is in. Sure, he would’ve been better off bringing it up himself — “You should know this happened, the accusation was fradulent” — but we can understand why the guy might not want to rehash the time when he was, apparently, falsely accused of beating his sick wife. Might not be the most pleasant of memories.
In the meantime, however, Lyons continues his love for Atkins by dropping the battery bomb at the bottom of the column. Bet Fredd wishes that didn’t happen either.
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