Crime

Headline Surfer® graphic / Rocco Park, 2490 Sunset Drive, shown here at left, is where the body of a woman was found early Tuesday.

NEW SMYRNA BEACH -- The body of a woman was found this morning at a city park in Turnbull Bay, New Smyrna Beach cops said.

The discovery was made just after 6 a.m. at the park, located at 2490 Sunset Drive, Master Sgt. Eugene Griffith said in a press release, adding her death may have resulted from a drug overdose. Her name or age was not released.

An autopsy is scheduled for Wednesday to try nd determine the manner and cause of death.

Headline Surfer® graphic / Ruthy's Kozy Kitchen, 618 W. Canal St., as shown in the locator map in the inset, was the target of an overnight burglar or burglars,  who broke in through a window and made off with an undisclosed amount of cash.

NEW SMYRNA BEACH -- Ruthy's Kozy Kitchen on West Canal Street, the eatery that nearly closed four years ago because of 18 months worth of delays in completion of a CRA-funded street beautification project, was burglarized earlier this week, New Smyrna Beach cops said in a delayed report.

Photos for Headline Surfer® / John DeJesus, 27, a reputed member of the Latin Kings gang, a drug dealer and sex offender, shown at left, now stands accused of first-degree murder in the April 30 shooting death of 22-year-old Yoliz Marie Borrero, shown in the inset.

ORLANDO -- Orange County Sheriff's investigators this morning arrested the man they said shot and killed his live-in girlfriend in cold blood right in front of her two small children earlier this month -- the youngest he is the father to.

John DeJesus, 28, was presented before a judge just before noon where he was ordered remanded to the Orange County Jail on a no-bond status, pending a formal arraignment to answer to the charge of first-degree murder.

OAK HILL, Fla. -- An 18-year-old has been booked into the Volusia County Branch Jail in Daytona Beach on DUI manslaughter charges in the July 24, 2013, horrific wreck on Maytown Road that took the life of his cousin.

Headline Surfer® graphic / Sheriff's homicide investigators are awaiting autopsy results before deciding if criminal charges will be levied in the early Easter morning shooting death of Sanford Olson at his residence at 7 Seabreeze Drive in Ormond by-the-Sea as shown in this locator map. His wife told a neighbor he was accidentally shot.

ORMOND BEACH -- The Volusia County Sheriff's Office's Major Case Unit is continuing to investigate the fatal shooting early Sunday morning of a 55-year-old man in Ormond-by-the-Sea, just north of the Ormond Beach city limits.

The victim's wife was being interviewed about the death at 7 Seabreeze Drive after receiving a call at 2:52 a.m. about a shooting that had happened. When they arrived on scene, deputies discovered he had been shot to death.

Headline Surfer® graphic / A homeless man known to frequent the area of Deltona Boulevard and Enterprise Road, as shown here in this screenshot, tried to snatch a woman's purse. His description is posted in the story below. If you see him, the Volusia County Sheriff's Office urges you to please call 9-1-1.

DELTONA, Fla. -- When the 36-year-old woman arrived Friday morning at work in Deltona and encountered a man who reeked of alcohol, she didn’t know him by name. But she recognized him as the homeless man who often sleeps on the park bench in front of her business at a plaza on Deltona Boulevard.

When he asked her for money, the woman said she didn’t have any to spare. And that’s when things got physical.

Police Chief Michael Chitwood ramps up rhetoric, with name calling, describing wanted African-American suspected accomplice as 'gun-toting thug'

Photos for Headline Surfer® / Deandre Peterson, shown, in the inset, has been booked into the Volusia County Branch Jail on a murder charge in the shooting death of Quuordre Wiley, 21, and police are looking for Justin Williams, suspected in an earlier related shooting incident.

DAYTONA BEACH -- Violent crime continues unabated in Daytona Beach with no end in sight as witnessed by a cold-blooded murder on a Friday afternoon as gunfire rang out in a salon.

Ebony Wilkerson, 32 and pregnant, is shown here at first apperance Saturday at the Volusia County Branch Jail courtroom in Daytona Beach before County Judge Shirley Green where she was ordered held on $1.2 million bail on three counts of attempted first-degree murder of her three children, ages 3, 9, & 10, after purposey driving her minivan into the Daytona  surf.

DAYTONA BEACH -- As she drove her minivan into the rough ocean surf at Daytona Beach, 32-year-old Ebony Wilkerson locked the doors of her 2012 Honda Odyssey, put up the windows and told her three frightened children --ages 3,9, & 10 -- to close their eyes and go to sleep.

Photo for Headline Surfer® / Kelly Ann Balerdas had obvious signs of trama to her body, Kissimmee police said, of the unsolved homicide of March 6, 2004.

KISSIMMEE, Fla. – It was almost a decade ago ago that 22-year-old Kelly Ann Balderas was found slain in her motel room at the former Breeze Inn, located at 900 E. Vine St. by the hotel manager in well-being check after she hadn't bee heard from by friends for three days, Kissimmee cops said.

The locale is now a drug treatment facility. And it is near where Banderas's mother, mother, Diana Bryan, will be holding a candlelight vigil at 7 p.m. Saturday, in remembrance of her daughter who was beaten to death. The homicide remains unsolved.

The vigil will be at the corner of Damon and East Vine streets, said Stacie Miller, spokeswoman for the Kissimmee police force.

It was 10 years earlier on March 6, 2004, that Kelly Ann Balderas's body was found at 4 p.m. in her hotel room with obvious signs of trauma to her body, Miller said.