On Feb. 15, 2024, Lori Stover found a surprising and confusing letter in her mailbox. The postage did not note who sent this message or why they were doing it. The return address was merely listed as the Hernando County Courthouse, along with Stover’s full name, written on a sheet of paper taped to the postage. Inside of the blank envelope were two typed pages that reviewed the details of the arrest of Henry Enrique Collazo from 2018 and was titled, “statement of events.” The mysterious correspondence also contained pictures and made multiple mentions of a woman named Tammy, who was Collazo’s girlfriend at the time.
As Stover’s late husband, Ronald “Pat” Bassett, had served locally as a deputy, the local business owner was naturally a little uneasy. Upon calling law enforcement to check on the situation, the dispatcher was already aware of the letters – letters plural. It turns out that she was not the only one to receive this type of message. At least three other people, one woman and two men, received eerily similar letters. As it clearly did not happen by accident, what was the connection between these individuals?
It turns out that the quartet all served on the same jury during a pair of 2018 court cases. On May 7 of that year, the defendant, Henry Enrique Collazo, was found guilty of “domestic battery by strangulation,” while the other charge of second or subsequent battery was dismissed. Collazo, also known as “Henry Flacco,” had previously been found guilty of a second offense of “driving with license suspended or revoked” and “DUI damage to property or person” in December of 2014. Other cases were either dismissed, transferred to another court, or ruled Nolle Prosequi (unwilling to prosecute).
Now, Stover was nervous. Collazo was sending seemingly ominous letters and he had a potential reason to be angry with her. Henry explained to the authorities that he simply wrote the two-page document for a job application and decided to send copies of his explanation to the former jurors. When officers asked the felon why he had not signed his name, Collazo reasoned he did not need to as he was sure the jurors would remember him, Stover was told. “This was six years ago. I cannot even remember what I ate yesterday,” the widow noted. She added that she remembered some details but not everything. While there was technically no threatening language written on any of the pages, it certainly felt less than friendly to the woman who is looking to file charges against Collazo.
“Although he did not threaten me, his threat is that ‘I know your name and I know where you live.’ That is what I believe his threat is to me,” Stover said. “So, now I am having to order outdoor cameras and everything because I am afraid of what this man will do.”
That was only part of her concern, though. She was also bewildered by his ability to find the jurors’ names. How did he do it? After speaking with law enforcement and the clerk of the court, she found that there was general confusion as to how someone could even locate this information. When deputies looked into the matter, though, they found that jurors’ names are made public from the moment they are chosen. Jury seating charts are even made available for all court cases under the First Amendment, though they can be somewhat difficult to track down. This is a major concern for Stover, as she used to be the only one she knew who enjoyed fulfilling her civic duty as a juror. That has since changed.
“I am the only person I have ever known that has never minded serving on a jury because I believe that it is my right and responsibility,” said Stover. “I never try to get out of it […] I am never going to serve on a jury again because now I have an actual case number where this guy sent it, and I will write that as my excuse for not serving on a jury. It is very sad because already people try to get out of it.”
As she was a teacher for 29 years, Stover believes it important to keep people informed on issues, especially like this. If nothing can be done to make past and future jurors’ information more secure, it might be best to at least ensure that those selected citizens are made aware of this fact moving forward.
