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What do you get with a menage a trois, drugs, a revolver and a SWAT team? Trouble in Pasco County

 
Published Aug. 30, 2012

ZEPHYRHILLS — First came the menage a trois. Then the gunshots. Somebody called the SWAT team.

By Thursday morning, Pasco sheriff's deputies had most of the details sorted out and a husband and wife in jail.

Here's their report:

David Rice and his wife, Mindi, both 29 and already familiar with the Pasco jail, spent Wednesday evening at their home on 20th Street injecting themselves with prescription drugs and having sex with a 24-year-old woman.

They all fell asleep. Then Mrs. Rice woke early Thursday to find her husband trying to have sex again with their friend — without her, deputies said. This made her angry, sheriff's spokesman Kevin Doll said. Mr. Rice insisted "he was only trying to grab the covers to cover himself," Doll added.

Mrs. Rice grabbed a loaded revolver, threatened to kill the woman and fired a round into the ceiling, deputies reported. Her husband took the gun away, authorities said, and squeezed her throat "with one hand while holding the handgun beside her face."

"B----, I'll f------ kill you," Mr. Rice told his wife, according to the report.

He fired the gun, the bullet whizzing past Mrs. Rice's head and lodging into the wall.

The woman called 911 and managed to escape about 2 a.m. The husband and wife refused to come outside, so the SWAT team assembled.

The standoff lasted two hours. The couple eventually came outside voluntarily, but Mr. Rice fought with deputies who shocked him with a Taser. He ran back inside, barricading doors, but was persuaded to give up by negotiators.

The couple remained in jail Thursday, charged with aggravated assault.

Mr. Rice was also charged with obstructing officers and held without bail. He was supposed to be in court for a trial Sept. 4 to face charges of burglary, grand theft and possession of oxycodone, court records state.

Mrs. Rice, held in lieu of $5,000 bail, was sentenced in June to two years of felony probation for credit card fraud, according to the Florida Department of Corrections. Authorities said she stole the credit card in 2011 so she could bail her husband out of jail.

Erin Sullivan can be reached at esullivan@tampabay.com or (727) 869-6229.