The Palm Beach Post from West Palm Beach, Florida • Page 113

THE PALM BEACH POST WEDNESDAY, JULY 8, 1987 3B Escapee sought by Florida found in Mississippi jail By STEVE PETRONE Palm Beach Post Staff Writer A West Palm Beach man who escaped from a law officers at a North Florida courthouse in February has been in a Mississippi prison for more than two months, authorities learned Tuesday. Dewel Dean Snoderly, 24, has been in the Harrison County, jail since he was arrested April 24 near Gulfport, said Columbia County Detective Lt. Neal Nydan. He was charged with two counts of burglary and one count of possession of narcotics and is being held without bail, a jail spokesman said. Snoderly was sentenced to 33 years in prison after a second-degree murder conviction in the 1985 death of John W.

Clerke. a druggist at Butterfield Drugs in Fort Pierce. Clerke died from a heart attack during a robbery. At the time of that robbery, Snoderly was free on bond after an armed robbery at the Forum Pharmacy in West Palm Beach. He was arrested in January 1986 in connection with a drug store robbery in Pass Christian, Miss.

Florida officials began looking for Snoderly in Mississippi after learning that a man who escaped with him had been fatally shot Saturday by a Mississippi trooper. Monday, Mississippi authorities identified the dead man as Herman Johnson, 33, of West Palm Beach. The shooting has been ruled a justifiable homicide. When Columbia County detectives learned of the Johnson's shooting, they contacted Mississippi officials to see if Snoderly was with Johnson, Nydan said. Nydan said Columbia County detectives have tried to find Johnson and Snoderly since they slipped through a second-floor window of the county courthouse Feb.

24. "We knew nothing about his being arrested until today," Nydan said Tuesday. "We had no idea." Johnson was serving a life sentence at Union Correctional Institution in Raiford when the pair escaped. He had been convicted in 1983 of robbery and armed robbery in Bay County, a spokesman at the institution said. The trooper was traveling north on Interstate 59 Saturday afternoon when he crossed the highway to offer help to a car parked about four miles north of Laurel, according to Col.

D.D. Cvitanovich, head of the Mississippi Highway Patrol. The driver of the 1977 Mercury then began took off at a high rate of speed, Cvitanovich said. The car stopped abruptly, and the trooper asked the driver, Johnson, for his license. Johnson then pointed a handgun at the trooper, who wrestled with him, Cvitanovich said.

Johnson began firing at the trooper, who shot Johnson in the head, he said. The Associated Press contributed to this report. Dewel Dean Snoderly escaped from a North Florida courthouse in February. fmf JM Prosecutor claims: highway trap sel in woman's slaying I 1 'A SHAUN STANLEYStaff Photographer Witness Gregory Prichard, 1 7, shows size of rock he said he saw Timothy Fuse throw. WIRK-AM turning off country music, on rock, pop oldies By SCOTT BENARDE Palm Beach Post Staff Writer LAKE WORTH Country music fans who listen WIRK-AM (1290) soon will have to find another country station.

To capture more listeners in the 25 to 54 age group and boost stagnant ratings, the station is switching to a syndicated rock and pop oldies-only format called "Pure Gold." Unike other stations that broadcast songs from the 1950s, '60s and '70s, the new format will not include any songs from the 1980s. WIRK-FM (108), better known as Country will keep its country format. On Aug. 1, WIRK-AM will become WPBG, broadcasting artists like Chuck Berry, the Beach Boys, Elvis Presley, the Everly Brothers and Elton John. The 24-hour-a-day programming will be supplied via satellite by a Dallas-based syndication company, Satellite Music Network, supplemented with local weather and news broadcasts.

"We weren't using the station to its full advantage," station General Manager Ed Boyd said. "We felt that the 25 to 54 (age group), the people that grew up in the rock era, weren't being fully served. "It's fun to be able to provide a sound that a lot of stations dabble in, but no one broadcasts all the time," Boyd added. "We're going for those folks who grew up in the early days of rock." Only 0.4 percent of the people between 25 and 54 listening to the radio at a specific time were listening to the station, according to Arbitron and Birch Ratings surveys. Even with the change, Boyd isn't expecting miracles.

"It's not going to be a number one format," he said. "But we're looking for a stronger combined effort from both stations." WIRK is owned by Price Communications Corp. of New York. It first began broadcasting in Palm Beach County in 1947. It was a rock station during the '50s, '60s and '70s.

In the early '80s the station changed its call letters to WPCK and played big-band music. By 1985, the station changed to WIRK-AM and a country format that also was supplied by a music syndication service. Last year, the station began simulcasting the programming of its more popular FM sister station, Country K. -11 By SCOTT G. CAMPBELL Palm Beach Post Staff Writer WEST PALM BEACH Elaine Rock was killed because she was a white woman in the wrong place at the wrong time, the prosecutor told a jury Tuesday.

But the defense said police convinced Timothy Fuse to make a false confession. Assistant State Attorney Charles Burton said Fuse recruited some friends as lookouts to tell him when white motorists were coming so he could throw rocks at them. But Defense Attorney Barry Krischer said Fuse is the victim of a bad investigation and bad intelligence that allowed police to talk him into a false confession. The state has no credible evidence to charge Fuse with first-degree murder, he said. "What the state doesn't give you in its case, we're going to give you in ours," he said.

"We did the investigation that they didn't." Krischer said at least five people will testify that Fuse was with them at the time of the killing. On Nov. 25, Rock was driving her Volkswagen van along the 3500 block Old Dixie Highway in Riviera Beach when a piece of concrete smashed through the driver's side window and into her face. The impact blinded Rock and broke her nose and cheek. She lost control of the car and it crashed into a concrete utility pole.

She died shortly after the crash. Gregory Prichard, the lone witness to the attack, at first told the jury Tuesday that he saw Fuse throw the rock at Prichard's car. He also testified that he later heard Fuse say, "That was good for her," and that Fuse thought the whole thing was funny. But under cross-examination by Krischer, Prichard said he had lied to attorneys about what he acluaify saw and about his own arrest record. 1 In testimony taken before.the trial, Prichard had said he hal-6nry been arrested once when he had been arrested at least five times in 1986.

He also said he only recognized Fuse but not another youth, Charles Tatum, who acted as" a lookout. "He didn't throw the rock so-1 didn't want to get him in Prichard said of Tatum. Palm Beach County Medical Examiner James Benz said Rock might have survived if she had been wearing a seat belt. The inja-ries caused by the rock by themselves would not have been fatal, although she likely would have been permanently blind in her left eye, Benz said. Fuse's taped confession to police is expected to be played for the jury today.

Krischer said Fuse, who has an IQ of about 57, just didrtt understand what he was saying-tb police. "You'll hear that he's basically just agreeing with what the detectives tell him," Krischer said. "First he'll tell one story. when that doesn't agree with the fact, the detectives will ask him; 'Didn't it happen like and he'll just agree." i -A A 4T- I Mi laitlflft i MjfiiHiill i' i Riviera Beach Detective Sgt. Dale Long holds concrete believed to be cause of crash.

PGA Boulevard spans activated after weekend of traffic hassles I I 1 ALLEN EYESTONEStaff Photographer Only one span could be raised on the bridge until 5 p.m. Tuesday. By JOE BROGAN Palm Beach Post Staff Writer PALM BEACH GARDENS -The troubled PGA Boulevard bridge over the Intracoastal Waterway returned to normal Tuesday afternoon, but not before causing weekend traffic hassles to north county residents and revenue losses to businesses. The bridge's problems are not over. Sometime late this summer or early fall, work will begin on yet another repair project on the "Please-Go-Around" bridge by the state Department of Transportation.

Already the bridge has cost the state $1.7 million for repairs. The bridge returned to normal operation as of 5 p.m. Tuesday after workmen found a malfunctioning electrical switch that caused the one bridge span to remain locked in the upright position, a state official said. "The electricians who were trouble-shooting the job (Tuesday) found an electrical switch that was giving an OK reading that was not OK," DOT Maintenance Engineer David Smith said. The bridge spans were cranked down manually on Sunday so car traffic could resume.

Smith said Tuesday that both east and west spans now can be raised for boat traffic for the first time since 4 p.m. Sunday. From Saturday afternoon to Sunday afternoon, only the west span could be raised for boats and the bridge was closed to highway fic. Local business people said Tuesday that they will be relieved when the bridge's problems are over. Scott Vogel, general manager of the Waterway Cafe on the southwest side of the bridge, said, "Business took a 40 to 50 percent dive over the weekend.

It was a big holiday weekend and we expected to do a big business, but then we had no bridge." Jorge Adan, owner of the Sub Queen, about a half-mile west on PGA Boulevard, said his usual heavy beach-related business was killed by the malfunctioning bridge. James Roderick, 75, a resident of The Meadows Mobile Home Park on PGA Boulevard, said bridge problems don't bother him. "I don't go that way anymore," he said. "I take Prosperity (Farms Road) north or south and then head east." The stuck bridge didn't faze Scott Hall, either. Hall, 34, a maintenance supervisor, lives on a canal-front house on Barnard Drive near the bridge.

"It didn't bother me. I went out by (speed) boat," he said. The DOT had troubleshooters on the bridge through Tuesday working to repair the switch problem, the DOT'S Smith said. "They said they were able to get the switch operating again. I don't know whether that involved cleaning the terminals or what.

I do know that the saltwater environ- ment is the most hostile there is for any machinery," he said. Meanwhile, Al Ewing, a DOT engineer in charge of bridge rehabilitation, said a $147,300 contract unrelated to the latest difficulties with the bridge has been awarded to Quality Electric Co. of Clewis-ton. "It would replace all four (span) drive motors and related electrical control systems and take 30 days," Ewing said. "I don't know how old these motors are, but they were original equipment when the bridge was built." The bridge went through repairs on its trunnions, upon which the bridge spans sit, and its locks, which hold the bridge spans in place.

The project took almost two years, and the bridge often was closed to motorists. It began as a $370,000 project but eventually cost $1.7 million. 300 apply: at hotel -in Boca Marriott-Crocker boss enthused at turnout" By MARK JOSAITIS Palm Beach Post Staff Writer BOCA RATON Eighteen-year-old Kim Altendorf of Boca Raton wants a job so much at the new Boca Raton Marriott-Crocker Center that she arrived at 8:30 a.m. Tuesday 30 minutes before doors opened and only 90 minutes after getting off the midnight shift at her current job in south Fort Lauderdale. "Lazy," was Altendorf's cqra-ment when Louis Johnson of Deer-field Beach admitted he arrived an hour later than she to apply for a job as a sous chef.

More than 300 people ranging'jn age from 18 to 55 showed up at tlje Tower 1 building in the Crocker Center Tuesday, the first day "of interviews for 250 jobs at the 251-room hotel scheduled to open Aug. Altendorf, who lives near the hd-tel, said she has been waiting anxiously for the hotel to hire workers since construction began. "I drive 60 miles each day for my job," said Altendorf, who plans 1o begin studying management at Palm Beach Junior College in A-gust. -J The hotel is one of the first in the area to open under the recently adopted Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986, and statu Services workers were on hand to help immigrants fill out necessary paper work. General manager Murray Do.Vi! said he plans to interview aH'ofrhe final candidates for jobs.

"We'll make our final selection after we've looked at everybody far the applicants have been wonr derful. They look good, and they'ra displaying a lot of what we're 'look ing for," he said. Applications will be accepted from 9 a.m. to 7 p.m. today through' Friday and from 9 a.m.

to 1 p.m. Saturday at the Tower 1 building-irr the Crocker Center, 5200 "Town" Center 1 Streetwise Response time would almost double if suburban Lantana fire station closes Boynton project bids to be advertised By AMY DRISCOLL Palm Beach Post Staff Writer Closing a suburban Lantana fire station would save the county $450,000 but could cost the area's residents far more by nearly doubling the response time for rescue workers. Palm Beach County Fire Chief Herman Brice asked county commissioners Tuesday to consider closing Station 44 on Lantana Road, next to the Lantana airport. Two other fire stations would pick up the service for the area. The closing would result in a $450,000 savings to the county but would increase response time from 3'2 minutes to six minutes on calls in the area, which is south of the airport and east of Interstate 95 near Lantana Road, Brice said.

"It's a very difficult decision, to close a station," Brice said. "You could have a fire station on every corner, but you have to balance things. We have to provide adequate service in the entire county." If his proposal is approved, the station would close in October. Although the county's goal for an average response time is five minutes, residents of several other areas typically Kave to wait 10 Bids on the widening to four lanes of Boynton Beach Boulevard from Congress Avenue to one-half mile west of Military Trail in Boynton Beach will be advertised within one month, said Donald Knapp, director of engineering services for the Palm Beach County Engineering Depart: ment. Two-way traffic will be maintained during the yearlong construction, Knapp said.

Delray Beach The widening to four lanes of Congress Avenue from Linton Boulevard to Clint Moore Road is on schedule and should be completed in two weeks. Jupiter The resurfacing of U.S. 1 between the Intracoastal Waterway in North Palm Beach and the Intracoastal Waterway in Jupiter began Monday. The project should not cause traffic delays until next month when there will be periodic lane closings, said Jim Houck, an area engineer with the state Department of Transportation. Two- way traffic will be maintained during the project, which is expected to last until February.

Four-foot shoulders will be built on both sides of the road. West Palm Beach One lane of the bridge on Congress Avenue just south of Southern Boulevard in West Palm Beach is being closed periodically for repairs from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. weekdays. Traffic is being maintained in one of the two lanes in each direction.

At times there are long slowdowns. The Region A contract should be awarded within a month for major improvements at the intersection of State Road 76 and County Road 711 in Martin County, near the Tropical Park housing development and about 18 miles west of Stuart. Streetwise is a daily traffic report compiled by staff writer Joe Sullivan from information provided by state, county and city engineers. to 12 minutes, Brice said. "I'm not saying that because other people have longer response times that justifies closing the station, but I don't think six minutes is an unreasonable time." Brice cited response times of 10 to 12 minutes in areas west of Delray Beach and in Wellington.

The situation in those areas has existed for the past two years, since the county Fire-Rescue system was consolidated, he said. The average response time coun-tywide is about six minutes, he said. Another reason Brice has proposed closing the station is because Hypoluxo has decided not to renew its contract with the county. Hypoluxo will contract for such services with" Lantana. Closing the station would most affect the 200 homes in the San Castle development, south of Hypoluxo Road.

The station now serves those residents in about 3'2 minutes, responding to about 150 calls there last year. The county projected that about 70 calls next year would involve life-threatening situations. Brice said the county is hoping to strike a deal with Lantana to provide service to that area if the county agrees to provide backup engines for Lantana during emergencies..