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Leonora LaPeter Anton - Former Times Reporter
Leonora LaPeter Anton

Former Times Reporter

  1. Blood and Truth podcast returns with a new episode
    June 26• Narratives
    Blood and Truth: The Podcast is back with a new episode.
  2. Stay or go? A Florida English teacher weighs painful options
    May 2• Narratives
    English teacher Philip Belcastro has fun with students by wearing different outfits during class at St. Petersburg High School.
  3. Man killed in Wesley Chapel parking lot shooting
    Feb. 11• Breaking News
    A man was shot and killed in a Wesley Chapel parking lot on Friday night, the Pasco County Sheriff’s Office reported.
  5. Florida attorney general drops challenge in Zeigler DNA dispute
    Feb. 7• Florida
    Inmate William Thomas "Tommy" Zeigler, on Florida's death row in Union Correctional Institution, hopes that DNA testing of evidence in his case will set him free.
  6. DNA could crack a notorious Florida cold case — with infamous suspects
    Jan. 26• Crime
    Pat Myers, seen here in August 2022, pauses at the gravesite where his sister and her family are buried, at Oak Ridge Cemetery in Arcadia. The Walker family was murdered on December 19, 1959, and Myers has long hoped for closure as the murder remains one of the oldest unsolved cases in the state.
  7. Florida Attorney General meets rejection after effort to block Zeigler DNA testing
    Jan. 5• Crime
    Inmate William Thomas "Tommy" Zeigler has maintained his innocence and sought DNA testing to prove it for decades. In this image, he sat on Florida's Death Row in Union Correctional Institution in Raiford on June 21, 2018.
  8. Death row inmate Tommy Zeigler gets all-clear for DNA testing
    Dec. 19, 2022• Breaking News
    Inmate William Thomas "Tommy" Zeigler was convicted of the murders of his wife, in-laws and another man in his furniture store on Christmas Eve in 1975 in Winter Garden. Now he hopes DNA testing will reveal his innocence.
  9. Death row inmate Tommy Zeigler edges closer to long-sought DNA testing
    Oct. 27, 2022• Crime
    Inmate William Thomas "Tommy" Zeigler, photographed on Florida's Death Row in Union Correctional Institution, Raiford, Fla. on June 21, 2018. Zeigler was convicted of the murders of his wife, in-laws and another man in his furniture store on Christmas Eve in 1975 in Winter Garden, Fla.
  10. On the Tamiami Trail, surveying Hurricane Ian’s wrath of old Florida
    Oct. 4, 2022• Hurricane
    The Shell Factory and Nature Park damaged sign pictured on Sept. 30, 2022, in North Fort Myers. Hurricane Ian cost the complex thousands in damages by knocking out power, damaging the roof, carpet, nature park, and ruining restaurant and animal food.
  11. Delays, detours and panic: I-75 closure leaves motorists scrambling to get home
    Oct. 1, 2022• Hurricane
    Traffic is seen stopped along the northbound lanes of I-75 near Sumter Boulevard Friday. Flooding has shutdown both the north and south lanes until Saturday afternoon.
  12. Southwest Florida grapples with Hurricane Ian’s last-minute turn
    Sept. 28, 2022• Hurricane
    From left to right: Chris Iovanna, 31, Justin Short, 35, and Nick Patel, 38, work to place shutters on their restaurant, the Soda Fountain of Venice, on Tuesday, Sept. 27, 2022, in Venice, Fla. Venice residents are preparing for the impacts of Hurricane Ian.
  13. She sought her dream home in St. Petersburg — but had to leave to find it
    July 15, 2022• Real Estate
    Carrie Norris poses for a picture with her 11-year-old Shih-Tzu, Berand, in front of her Wimauma home. Moving to the suburbs came with tradeoffs.
  14. Crying kids alert St. Petersburg authorities to woman driving under influence: report
    July 10, 2022• Breaking News
    Annie Shockley, who is also known as Annie Robertson, is facing child neglect charges.
  15. Two shot to death Saturday near Plant City
    July 10, 2022• Crime
    Check tampabay.com for the latest breaking news and updates.
  16. Florida’s child support ‘carousel’ exhausts parents, costs kids
    May 4, 2022• Investigations & Narratives
    One Friday last July, siblings Bianca Torres, 11, and Sebastian Torres, 9, balance on a tree swing outside their Pembroke Pines home. Their mother watches, knowing how aware they are that finances are tight. Since their father stopped paying child support, she can’t afford to fix the hole in her roof and has pulled the plug on the children’s extracurriculars.
  17. Debate over DNA testing for death row inmate headed to Florida Supreme Court
    Oct. 20, 2021• Florida
    Tommy Zeigler in 2019 on Florida's Death Row at Union Correctional Institution. Zeigler was convicted in the Christmas Eve 1975 killing of his wife, in-laws and another man at his family’s furniture store in Winter Garden, just outside Orlando. Zeigler was shot in the stomach that night and has maintained that he was the victim of a robbery. [CHERIE DIEZ | Times]
  18. With spearguns, Florida women earned a place among the world’s elite
    Aug. 25, 2021• Sports
    Melody Engle brings up the amberjack she shot in the Gulf of Mexico. Engle started spearfishing about five years ago and is captain of the women's USA spearfishing team that will compete in Italy next month.
  19. Florida’s attorney general objects to death row inmate’s DNA testing
    June 1, 2021• Florida
    Tommy Zeigler photographed on Florida's death row in 2018.
  20. Second man on Florida’s death row to have DNA testing after prosecutor signs off
    May 25, 2021• Florida
    Henry Sireci in an early mugshot.
  21. State attorney agrees to let Tommy Zeigler perform DNA testing
    May 20, 2021• Florida
    Tommy Zeigler has been on death row since 1976.
  22. Lynching memorial marker unveiled in St. Petersburg
    Feb. 23, 2021• St. Petersburg
    Joseph Bethune, 62 of St. Petersburg raises his fist while observing the newly installed marker at Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Street and Second Ave South on Tuesday morning. On Nov. 12, 1914, John Evans a black laborer from Dunnellon was condemned by a secret council of 15 of St. Petersburg’s most influential citizens. He was then turned over to a mob of 1500 white residents and murdered. The location is where a mob hung and shot Evans, then sold postcards of the gruesome murder. The mission of the Pinellas Remembers Community Remembrance Project Coalition(CRPC) is to bear witness to the legacy of racial terror, epitomized by lynchings in America.
  23. History of a St. Petersburg lynching was hidden. Not anymore.
    Feb. 23, 2021• St. Petersburg
    Gwendolyn Reese, 71, president of the African American Heritage Association and a lifelong resident of St. Petersburg, poses near the intersection where, on Nov. 12, 1914, the public lynching of John Evans occurred. On Feb. 23, 2021, a memorial will be placed near the site.
  24. How did coronavirus overwhelm this nursing home so quickly?
    Dec. 3, 2020• Long Reads
    An outbreak. Evacuations. Forty families shattered.