Tearful woman gets judicial scolding, 3 days in jail for failing to show at domestic violence trial
A Florida television station has obtained a video showing a Seminole County judge sentencing a weeping woman to jail for failing to show up at the trial of the man she accused of abusing her.
Judge Jerri Collins appeared to have little patience for the woman’s explanation that anxiety was part of the reason she didn’t show up, WFTV reports in a story picked up by ABC News and Raw Story.
“You think you’re going to have anxiety now? You haven’t even seen anxiety,” Collins said (beginning at about 3 minutes into the video). “We had a jury—six people there—ready to try this [abuser], who has a prior criminal history of domestic violence. You were required to be here by a court order. You disobeyed a court order knowing that this was not going to turn out well for the state.”
The woman had accused her child’s father of choking her and grabbing a kitchen knife. He had a prior conviction for domestic battery.
The woman said she had moved out, she was trying to move on with her life and she wanted the case dropped. The alleged abuser lost his job when he was jailed for two weeks, and could not pay child support, the woman told the judge. She said she is living at her parents’ house and had to sell everything she owned. “I’m just not in a good place here,” she said through tears.
