STARKE—Joshua Lee Hall was first sentenced to five years’ drug offender probation after pleading to child neglect. According to an arrest report, witnesses saw Hall’s two young children running around the Bradford Motel and Campground parking lot and close to U.S. Highway 301 on March 28. Starke Police found Hall and his wife asleep in their camper with the door unsecured. Officers arrested the parents for child neglect, and both pleaded to the charges.
In June, while Hall was residing in Putnam County, he was arrested in Hawthorne for DUI. The arrest triggered a probation violation in the defendant’s child neglect conviction, and Circuit Judge James Colaw told Hall he was inclined to sentence him to 18 months in prison to close out the case.
However, Hall told the judge he was fighting to keep his family together and asked for one last shot. The judge said he would give Hall one last chance, reinstating the defendant’s probation and tightening DOC’s supervision to community control for the next 12 months.
