A hole-in-one photo led to the arrest of a suspect in the death of an 87-year-old Villager.
Dean Zook and his wife had gone out to dinner on the evening of June 28 at Glenview Country Club when the front bumper of his white 2005 Toyota Avalon bumped the front bumper of a parked black 2010 Lexus RX350. A man, who believed his vehicle had been damaged, was apparently enraged when he saw what had happened.
“What the hell, you hit my car!” the man shouted at Zook.
Zook asked to exchange insurance information, but the man responded by punching Zook in the jaw, pushing him backward. Zook attempted to put up his hands to protect himself, but was unsuccessful due to the “continuing punches” being thrown by his assailant, who suddenly realized that the car that had been struck was not his, and walked away.
A call was placed to 911 and Sumter County sheriff’s deputies found Zook and his wife in the parking lot. The Villages Public Safety Department also responded to the scene, after Zook began slurring his words and stumbled. He was transported by ambulance to UF Health-The Villages Hospital. Hospital personnel discovered Zook had suffered a brain bleed and he was flown by helicopter to UF Health-Shands Medical Center in Gainesville. At the time, he was “unresponsive.” He was placed on hospice care at Shands on July 15 and died the following day, “due to the trauma he sustained from being punched.”
The day after the incident, the sheriff’s office posted surveillance images of the suspected assailant on social media. The story was picked up by Villages-News.com.
The Glenview surveillance showed the man entering the country club to pick up a to-go food order. While he was walking through the restaurant, he bumped into a server carrying drinks, causing them to spill on a patron sitting at the bar.
The release of the photos triggered a tip from someone who said he’d seen the assailant at Havana Country Club, wearing similar clothes as he had been wearing at Glenview on the day of the attack. The tipster shot a photo of the man “sitting at a table with several unknown females,” according to the arrest report. The tipster said the man’s name was “Bob” and sent the photo to the sheriff’s office.
A detective’s Google search led to a photo of a Village of Polo Ridge resident Robert Moore which had been published by Villages-News.com. In the photo, Moore was smiling in celebration of a hole-in-one at Tarpon Boil Executive Golf Course.
“Moore appeared to be wearing the same shoes, shorts and sunglasses as seen in the video surveillance from Glenview Country Club,” the detective wrote in the affidavit of probable cause.
The detective also noted that the article indicated that the 75-year-old lives in the Village of Polo Ridge, “which is in close proximity to the Glenview Country Club.”
The detective discovered that Moore is the owner of a black 2022 Lexus RX350, a close match to the vehicle that was struck by Zook on that fateful evening at the country club. The detective also called up Moore’s driver’s license photo and found that it matched the Glenview surveillance image and the hole-in-one photograph.
The Massachusetts native was arrested Thursday on a charge of aggravated manslaughter of an elderly person. He was booked at the Sumter County Detention Center and released after posting $30,000 bond.
