OCALA, Fla. – Body-worn camera video obtained by News 6 shows the growth of complaints and issues over the course of a year that led to the shooting of an Ocala mother in June.
Susan Lorincz, 58, is charged with manslaughter in the shooting death of Ajike Owens on June 2. The sheriff’s office said Lorincz shot Owens through a locked metal door and killed her after the mother went to confront her neighbor. Owens wanted to talk to Lorincz about her treatment of children who were playing in an open field near the accused killer’s home.
The sheriff’s office said it had about a dozen calls over the course of a year from Lorincz regarding the neighborhood children being loud and trespassing on her property, though deputies said the children actually were playing in the open field. Lorincz would claim the field was part of the property she rented in the complex, even though Owens and neighbors said that was not true, records show.
Throughout the videos, Lorincz complains to the deputies that she works from home and needs peace and quiet, but the children are constantly screaming and yelling.
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Videos show the neighborhood has many children, not just Owens’ children, playing outside, including in the open field. The calls range in dates from February of 2022 through April 2023.
A Feb. 25, 2022, video lists a notable encounter, according to the sheriff’s office, where Lorincz accuses Owens of throwing a “no trespassing” sign at Lorincz in a confrontation about one of Owens’ children walking the family dog near Lorincz’s property.
Lorincz said the landlord bought the sign and placed it next to a tree in the communal area. Lorincz told deputies that when she pointed out the sign to Owens, the mother took the sign and threw it at Lorincz, striking her leg. Owens, however, told deputies in the video that she threw the sign, but did not know that she had hit Lorincz. Deputies told Owens that she and her children needed to stay away from Lorincz’s property.
They wrote up the incident but did not arrest Owens, something Lorincz did not appear to be happy about in the video.
In an Aug. 10, 2022, video, Lorincz claims she had bad migraines and the children screaming and yelling were causing her harm.
Lorincz said in the video the children were disrespectful.
“As long as they’re not on your property, they can pretty much play where they want to play,” the deputy said.
“I don’t want to be intimidated by them screaming and yelling at me, telling me I’m a (expletive), calling me Karen, I mean they’re calling me names,” Lorincz said.
Lorincz also said in the video it wasn’t true that the open field was not private property. However, the deputy insists if the lot is not private property, she can’t tell the children not to play there.
In a Nov. 19, 2022 video, a Marion County sheriff’s deputy takes a call from Lorincz who reports that her mail has been stolen and accuses Owens of doing it. In the video, Lorincz claims she has video of Owens going into her mailbox, though Lorincz said the video doesn’t show that Owens took any mail.
She also tells the deputy in the video the kids stole the “No Trespassing” sign, threw bottles of water against the sliding glass door and banged on the door so hard that they broke the door.
The deputy told Lorincz to get everything recorded and documented going forward, with her smartphone or outside cameras, saying otherwise it’s a “he said, she said” situation.
In the video, the deputy also suggested getting property schematics to show the boundaries of Lorincz’s property and the public area.
In a video from December 2022, Lorincz told deputies that a neighbor threatened her. When deputies talked to others in the neighborhood as part of the investigation, a neighbor recounted alarming moments with Lorincz and called her “crazy.”
A deputy also spoke to some of the children in the neighborhood, who said Lorincz called them offensive names.
Then in a video from April of this year, Lorincz called deputies to have a group of children trespassed for playing on her property, but it turned out she doesn’t own the pavement the kids were playing on.
That same day a neighbor asked to speak with deputies about Lorincz’s behavior.
“I was trying to reason with her ‘cause we were all playing over there, the kids were jumping, ‘All right let’s go,’ and she’s like, “Hey, you know what? One day you guys are gonna die” and I just went like, whoa,” the neighbor told the deputy.
The neighbor also said Lorincz thinks she owns everything and calls law enforcement officers very often.
The attorney for Owen’s family released the following statement in regards to the body camera footage.
Lorincz is still in the Marion County jail.
Attorney Statement on Bodycam Footage by Sam Dunne on Scribd
[VIEW RELEASED BODY CAMERA FOOTAGE BY CLICKING IN ANY OF THE MEDIA PLAYERS BELOW]
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