Commentary: Why you should ‘check the box for Fox’

As your chief assistant state attorney for the five-county 20th Judicial Circuit for the last several years, I have overseen a staff of 300, including 120 prosecutors and a $26 million budget.

While I am the only candidate with State Attorney’s Office supervisory or administrative experience — 14 years — I also continue to prosecute major cases. Most recently, I prosecuted Mesac Damas in Collier County, successfully seeking and obtaining six death sentences for the brutal murders of his wife and five young children.

I am proud that, according to the Florida Department of Law Enforcement Annual Uniform Crime Reports, the 20th Circuit has had the lowest crime rate of all 20 judicial circuits in Florida for each of the last six years. This reflects the excellent partnership we have with law enforcement and the community.

However, I will never rest on this low crime rate and will always look for ways to improve with new and better approaches to ensure public safety.

My first priority is keeping our community safe. My husband served 30 years with the Collier County Sheriff’s Office and we have raised four children here. I recognize that the No. 1 duty of a prosecutor is to keep you safe. I have been instrumental in making sure we continue to fight crime through successful initiatives such as narcotics trafficking operations in Collier County using complex wiretaps, racketeering prosecutions against violent gang members in Lee County, and cold case prosecutions in Charlotte County.

I will continue to work hard for you to keep our crime rate low and to ensure the safety of our community through a combination of obtaining tough sentences for violent and habitual offenders, while seeking accountability and rehabilitation for nonviolent first-time offenders. This proven approach stops the cycle of crime and keeps our community safer while saving taxpayers money.

We also have a high success rate, with 88.1 percent of felonies prosecuted in 2016-17 resulting in guilty dispositions, according to the Florida Office of the State Court Administrator.

Along with my 14 years of prosecution administrative experience, including being the office head in Hendry and Glades counties from 1998 to 1999 and office head in Collier County from 1999 to 2002, I have almost 30 years of trial experience during which I have tried hundreds of cases.

I am the only candidate to have tried a first-degree murder case. Since the 1990s I have tried numerous murder cases, including nine first-degree murder death penalty cases, the last being the Damas case.

In addition to the support of current State Attorney Steve Russell, I am proud to have been endorsed by Lee County Sheriff Mike Scott, Collier County Sheriff Kevin Rambosk, Charlotte County Sheriff Bill Prummell, Hendry County Sheriff Steve Whidden and Glades County Sheriff Dave Hardin. This is a reflection of the excellent relationship I have partnering with law enforcement to hold criminals accountable.

I have also been endorsed by many other organizations in our community including the National Rifle Association and Unified Sportsmen of Florida, with an A rating for my strong support of the Second Amendment; Businesspeople United for Political Action Committee (BUPAC); The Hispanic Vote; the Royal Palm Coast Realtor Association; the Charlotte Builders and Realtors Associations; the Robert E. Lister Fraternal Order of Police, and the Naples Daily News.

I hope you will vote for me in the Aug. 28 primary and allow me to continue serving you as state attorney for the 20th Judicial Circuit.

Fox is a Republican candidate for state attorney of the 20th Judicial Circuit on the Aug. 28 ballot. A commentary from opponent Chris Crowley was published Tuesday, Aug. 14. The winner moves on to Nov. 6 when there is a write-in candidate.

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