Your Florida Daily: Orlando man convicted of killing wife, Duval school board suspends superintendent search

Five years after a mother is found dead in her Orlando home, her husband is convicted of killing her.

Last night, a jury found David Tronnes guilty of first-degree murder.

Shanti Cooper-Tronnes was beaten and strangled in April 2018.

David Tronnes claimed he found his wife unresponsive in the bathtub, but prosecutors argued there was evidence Tronnes cleaned up blood.

“He wiped down the bed rail, he brought water out to those blood stains in an attempt to clean it up. The shower, it was dry, that’s the testimony from law enforcement,” the prosecution said.

The defense maintained that Tronnes is innocent.

“The government is the one taking the insignificant and stacking them into a period of inferences and asking you to make the same assumptions,” the defense said.

Following the guilty verdict on Wednesday, the family of Shanti Cooper-Tronnes said they can finally feel a bit of peace.

“Your honor, my mom was the best person I ever knew,” Jackson Cooper said.

“The only word I come back to is evil. Only evil would do what he did to her,” James Cooper said.

The judge sentenced Tronnes to life in prison.

A South Florida GameStop clerk who police say shot and killed a shoplifter has been charged with manslaughter.

According to police in Pembroke Pines, Derrick Guerrero, 33, was working at the GameStop in a suburban Fort Lauderdale strip mall when a man grabbed five boxes of Pokémon Scarlet & Violet “ultra-premium” trading cards and ran toward the door.

The cards retail for $120 a box.

Police said Guerrero pulled a handgun and fired one shot, hitting the man in the side.

The shoplifter dropped the cards and ran outside to a waiting pickup truck, where a woman called police.

He died three hours later at a hospital.

Police said store security cameras show the shoplifter never threatened Guerrero nor displayed any weapons.

Under Florida’s “stand your ground” law, someone can use deadly force if there is a threat of death or great bodily harm to themselves or others, but it does not allow it simply to protect property.

Guerrero was being held at the Broward County Jail on $25,000 bond.

The Duval County School Board has suspended its search for a superintendent, citing a lack of qualified applicants.

The school board only received 10 applications for the top job in the district and about half of those applicants met the minimum qualifications the board wanted to see.

The board was supposed to choose semi-finalists on Wednesday with the goal of having a new superintendent in place in January, but the consultants assisting them in the search said some sitting superintendents were nervous about applying to a job that would start in the middle of the school year.

The board plans to re-advertise the position early on in 2024.

Random Florida Fact

Passing though Tampa on I-75, you can find the strangest bait shop in Florida.

Hong Kong Willie is a fishing business wrapped in buoys, nets and ropes.

Next to the colorful shop is a tall makeshift tree made of old fishing buoys and surrounded by a yard of ocean detritus.

While visitors will probably remember the shop for its outrageous art, locals say it has the best composting worms in town.