Courts want no part of fruit flap

SPRING HILL -- The long-running fruit battle between two octogenarian neighbors will have to be resolved without the help of cops or courts.

Italo Tomaselli, an 80-year-old neighbor with whom Ruth Snow virtually shares a lawn, avoided arraignment at the Hernando County courthouse this week for swiping a few tangerines from her tree last month. Prosecutors dropped the case Jan. 9, saying it did not warrant a court date. "This wasn't the sort of case to bring to trial," Erin Corcoran Daly, an assistant state attorney, said today.

Tomaselli, who spent three months in a German concentration camp near the end of World War II, faced a misdemeanor charge of theft after being accused of taking one tangerine from Snow's tree on Dec. 17.

Snow, an 81-year-old widow, called the Sheriff's Office after she said she watched Tomaselli walk into her back yard and walk off with fruit. Deputies asked whether he had any fruit, and Tomaselli grudgingly handed over a piece. The deputies then returned the tangerine to Snow, and Tomaselli was cited, according to a report from the Sheriff's Office.

Snow said Thursday she was disappointed that Tomaselli wouldn't at least have to pay a fine or face a judge. "He is a thief and a liar," Snow said. "He hasn't been taking just one at a time. He's been cleaning my trees off."

Snow said the seeds of their grudge were sown nearly 15 years ago, when she and her late husband argued with Tomaselli over the boundaries of their back yards. From that day on, she said, the grudge has taken root and yielded a lengthy conflict. "You don't want to fight with a neighbor, but we had to do something," Snow said. "It got to the point where my husband would be yelling at him. My blood pressure went sky high with him."

After her husband died five years ago, Snow said Tomaselli started regularly picking the fruit off the grapefruit and tangerine trees in her back yard. Snow had a couple of the trees cut down a year ago, hoping to discourage Tomaselli from coming into her yard. Tomaselli admits taking the occasional piece of fruit but said he did it to prevent them from going to waste.

Not long after the St. Petersburg Times reported his arrest, Tomaselli said, a woman came to his home and brought him a large bag of tangerines. "All the neighbors are in my favor," he said. His time in a concentration camp had a profound effect on him. "I saw hunger," Tomaselli said. "I didn't want to let all that fruit go to waste."

Snow, meanwhile, has gotten some flak for her stand. "I've got some awful letters in the mail," Snow said. "These do-gooders are driving me crazy. They're telling me I should put up a fence. ... If they want to pay for a fence, they can do it."

Joel Anderson, Times staff writer

Comments

[Diana]

Come on now he's not hurting anyone. He just needs alittle extra vitamin C!!! What is this woman going to do with a tree full of fruit? It's better to share tha watch it rot off the trees. Better file a report against them there fruit rats too, they are helping themselves. LMAO!! Good luck Tomaselli, throw a couple bucks her way.

[Jo]

Bet she bags up the fallen ones and puts them in the trash. Waste not want not. Sounds like she is carrying on her late husband's policy of unneighborliness. Let the man have a few pieces of the fruit which will go to waste anyway.