A Villager who had been charged with trying to run down a bicyclist after a confrontation at a gate, won’t be prosecuted in the case.
The prosecutor’s office has announced it will not pursue a case against 76-year-old Linda Lee Richards of the Village of Gilchrist who had been facing a charge of aggravated assault following the incident which occurred last year. The announcement that no information will be filed said, “The evidence is legally insufficient.”
Richards had been driving a car on Sept. 12 when she cut off the bicyclist in the roundabout at Buena Vista Boulevard and Pinellas Place, according to an arrest report from the Sumter County Sheriff’s Office. When they reached a nearby gate, she began a “verbal altercation” with the male bicyclist. Their exchange was captured on a gate camera. She and the bicyclist proceeded through the gate and she “drove her vehicle after him,” the report said, attempting to “strike him with her vehicle.” Her license plate number was captured in the surveillance images. The bicyclist shot video and it was turned over to law enforcement, as well as gate camera images from Community Watch.
During an initial interview at her home, Richards attempted to deny the incident had taken place, but she agreed to meet with law enforcement at the Sumter County Sheriff’s Office Public Safety Building at Pinellas Plaza. When she was confronted with still images captured by surveillance, Richards admitted she was the woman in the photos.
In 2022, Richards was arrested after a dispute with a painting contractor hired to perform work at her home.