Judge denies motion to release Nick Bollea

A Pinellas-Pasco circuit judge today refused to release Nick Bollea until he turns 18 because keeping him by himself at the Pinellas County Jail amounts to what his lawyers call "solitary confinement" and "cruel and unusual punishment."

Judge Philip J. Federico denied the motion, filed on Friday, in a three-sentence order that did not elaborate on his decision. A court administration spokesman said the judge studied the motion to determine if there were any legal issues to be argued.

"Had there been a need for such arguments, a hearing would have been scheduled," court public information officer Ron Stuart said in an e-mail to journalists.

Attorneys for Bollea, 17, had argued that the jail was treating their client more harshly than other non-violent first offenders. They also are accusing the Sheriff's Office of violating their client's right to privacy by allowing a television news camera crew to record one of his visits with his parents and by releasing recorded phone calls with his family.

A lawsuit filed in Pinellas-Pasco Circuit Court Monday asks a judge to rule that the recorded telephone conversations of jail inmates -- and especially those who are minors -- are not public records.

“Just because you have a conversation recorded, it doesn’t necessarily make it a public record,” one of Bollea’s attorneys, Kevin Hayslett of Clearwater, told the Times.

Another of Bollea's attorneys, Sandy Weinberg of Tampa, also asks a judge to rule that surveillance video -- such as that showing Bollea being booked -- is not a public record.

And he seeks an order stopping the Sheriff's Office from allowing news crews from recording Bollea's visits with his parents, as Bay News 9 did on May 27.

"Numerous local and national media outlets are playing the video footage and telephone recordings, causing irreperable harm by, among other things, impeding Bollea's ability to defend himself in a civil lawsuit" brought by the representative of John Graziano, Weinberg's lawsuit contends.

The coverage also has caused Bollea, 17, "extreme emotional distress," Weinberg wrote, because "as a minor forced to endure solitary confinement, he feels further isolated by the inability to communicate with his own family without his conversations being aired on national media outlets."

While the Sheriff's Office has concluded that Bollea, who was sentenced as an adult, is not entitled to claim that his calls with his parents are exempt from release under Florida's public records law, Bollea's attorneys argue otherwise.

In the lawsuit filed Monday, they contend that Bollea's calls are exempt from disclosure because he is still a minor, and Florida's law governing juvenile justice specifically makes much information related to juvenile defendants confidential.

They also contend that the television news crew shouldn't have been allowed to cover the Bollea family's visit with Nick because Florida's Administrative Code says that "private rights of inmates shall be observed by the media. No photographs, movie films, television tapes or recordings may be made without the consent of the inmate involved..."

In the motion filed on Friday, Bollea's attorneys complained he is being held in isolation 16 to 17 hours a day in a maximum security cell normally used for inmates who have disciplinary problems.

The "solitary confinement," combined with the high degree of media coverage of his incarceration, “amounts to cruel and unusual punishment,” according to his attorneys’ motion to modify his sentence. They ask that Bollea either be released on house arrest until July 27, when he turns 18 and would return to jail, or moved to minimum security.

George Tragos, a lawyer for John Graziano’s family, said he was appalled at the request.

“It doesn’t sound cruel compared to what John Graziano’s going through,” Tragos said.

Graziano, 23, has been in a semiconscious state since Aug. 26, when Bollea’s speeding Toyota Supra slammed into a tree. Bollea pleaded no contest May 9 to reckless driving with serious bodily injury.

Sheriff’s officials have said that although Bollea was sentenced as an adult, he is still a child, and Florida law requires them to house him separately from adult inmates.

Bollea’s 8½-by-16½-foot cell contains a sink, a toilet, a shower, a small desk and a bed. He is allowed reading materials, letters and commissary items.

In a letter last week, sheriff’s deputy general counsel Jennifer Monrose Moore wrote that Bollea’s “current classification, housing and treatment … are proper.”

The motion also contends the problems created by Bollea’s confinement were “magnified” by the sheriff’s release of 26 hours of calls between Bollea and his family.

In the tapes, Nick Bollea calls Graziano a “negative person” and discusses creating a new reality show with his father, former professional wrestler Terry Bollea, better known as Hulk Hogan.

Attorneys said Bollea’s hourlong video visits are his only contact with the outside world.

“Now,” they wrote, “Nick cannot even have a private conversation with his family without fear that it be immediately broadcast nationally.”

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-- Times Staff Writer