Deputies: Baseball Bat Used To Kill 'Sex Offender' (similar name as registered offender, wrong guy)

[The Straight Story]

Deputies: Baseball Bat Used To Kill 'Sex Offender'
Suspect Found Lying In Pond With Only Mouth Exposed

BITHLO, Fla. -- Two men have been arrested in connection to the slaying of a man inside his Bithlo trailer.

Deputies pulled Robert Pascale from a wooded area Thursday evening near the Fifth Avenue trailer where Hugh Edwards, 79, was found dead on Wednesday.

Investigators said Pascale was found by a bloodhound in a muddy pond with only his face exposed for air.

Pascale is at the Orange County Jail charged with first-degree murder. He told Local 6 Thursday evening that he mistakenly beat the wrong man.

When reporters asked him if he thought his alleged victim was a sex offender, he replied, "I thought he was, and the only thing running through my mind is what my uncle did to me." Pascale continued, "I hit him with a bat twice."

...

Although Edwards had a similar name and age as a registered sex offender, sheriff's officials said Edwards had absolutely no criminal record and was not a registered sex offender.

Department of Corrections records show that Pascale was released from the Orange County Jail in March after serving only 1 year rather than his original two-and-a-half-year sentence for grand theft, burglary, armed robbery, and battery on a corrections officer.

http://www.clickorlando.com/news/23545957/detail.html

[hobbit709]

1. Hopefully they'll keep him locked up a little longer this time.

[madokie]

2. Yeah,

like the rest of his sorry ass life

[OneTenthofOnePercent]

3. We should have hate crime legislation protecting rehabilitated offenders.

That's exactly what this was... a hate crime used to intimidate the community of reformed offenders as a whole.

[adamuu]

4. Hmm.. I never predicted anything like this would happen

:sarcasm: