“I waited for a vaccination appointment, and patience was rewarded,” King wrote. “Drive-thru in Pasco County. Moderna. No adverse effects. I think it was the National Guard running the show. Very cool. Get it done, folks. Let’s kill this thing.”
Attempts to reach King for further comment through publisher Scribner/Simon & Schuster were not immediately successful. However, if King struggled securing a vaccination appointment in Sarasota County, he would not be the only resident who has reported having issues with the county’s first-come, first-served registration system.
King’s most recent work includes last year’s novella collection “If It Bleeds” and 2019’s “The Institute,” which features local references including former Sarasota Police Chief Bernadette DiPino as a character, with new crime novels “Later” and “Billy Summers” set for release later this year. His foundation also recently covered the $6,500 cost to publish a 290-page manuscript
And that ultimately came down to one thing: longtime Police Chief Bernadette DiPino had to go.
It will be easy for some to solely attribute DiPino’s resignation – which will become official Friday evening and end an eight-year tenure that included many admirable accomplishments – to the escalating controversy sparked by the revelation that DiPino had joked about wanting to Taser a mentally ill homeless man who was heckling police personnel.
And true enough DiPino’s remark, which was reported to City Hall by an officer and led to an internal review and subsequent apology, had set the groundwork for police union members to consider taking a vote of “no confidence” in her – a step that would have represented an extraordinary and humiliating rebuke by the very people she was tasked to lead.
City of Sarasota names new police chief
By FOX 13 news staff
Published
Sarasota Police Chief James Rieser (Provided by: Sarasota Police Department)
SARASOTA, Fla. - On the heels of former Sarasota Police Chief Bernadette DiPino’s resignation, the city has announced her replacement.
On Friday morning, Captain James Rieser was named the new chief, who has grown up in Sarasota and started working for the agency in 1992.
DiPino submitted her resignation Wednesday. No official reason was provided for DiPino’s sudden exit, but the city manager recently had to counsel her after an anonymous complaint from someone within the department over an insensitive remark made about a man with a history of mental illness.