The Jessica Lunsford tragedy

Letter about Couey a signal not received?

Citrus officials are trying to figure out why FDLE mail last year about the accused man did not reach them.

	Couey

INVERNESS - In the weeks since John Couey was accused of killing Jessica Lunsford, officials have retraced their steps, trying to determine what, if anything, could have helped them prevent the 9-year-old girl's death in February.

Now, the Florida Department of Law Enforcement says Citrus officials had another signal that Couey was a sex offender who needed to be checked on: Couey never signed and returned a form sent July 30 to all Florida sex offenders.

In November, the FDLE said, it mailed a letter to the Citrus County Sheriff's Office with an attached list of the more than 50 Citrus sex offenders, including Couey, who hadn't responded, said department spokesman Rick Morera.

After Citrus sheriff's officials were told of the letter by the Palm Beach Post earlier last week, they scrambled to find it and a reason why they hadn't checked on Couey.

Their answer: They never got the letter.

"We didn't follow up on that letter because we weren't aware of that letter," said sheriff's spokeswoman Gail Tierney.

The Sheriff's Office is trying to figure out just what happened. But the deeper issue is, of course, could Jessica's life have been saved if law enforcement had checked on Couey in the fall?

Probably not, Tierney said.

"In our mind, (Couey) wasn't missing from Citrus County," Tierney said. "It's not to say that we wouldn't have (checked on him). But as far as whether that would have ... changed Jessica's fate, that's speculative."

Authorities thought then that they had a good fix on Couey's whereabouts.

First, he had notified state officials where he was in July, in an earlier letter sent by the department that he did fill out and return.

Because Couey returned this form on time, Tierney said, he was legally registered at a home on Grover Cleveland Boulevard in Homosassa. Couey never told officials that he often stayed at his half-sister's house, in sight of the Lunsford home. Jessica's body was found buried near the half-sister's house last month.

Second, Couey had been in Citrus County Jail until early November on a probation violation charge. Others on the list who had been out of authorities' sight for much longer probably would have been checked on before him, Tierney said.

Citrus County has two detectives who oversee sex offender monitoring, among other duties, and deputies check on offenders largely based on community tips. Couey wouldn't have been at the top of their list, she said.

"Well, I mean, it wasn't like we had a question, really, of Couey's whereabouts at that time, at least in the fall of 2004," Tierney said.

The reasons Citrus didn't receive the letter still remain a mystery, she said.

Tierney said she first read the letter after she requested a copy and received it by fax on Friday.

She noticed it was sent to an old address for the Sheriff's Office. The street in front of the office was renamed Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard, but the letter listed the former street name.

"We never got any kind of indication from the postal service that they didn't deliver," the department's Morera said. "We haven't had any issues with any agency that we send these letters to."

Abbie VanSickle can be reached at 352 860-7312 or vansickle@sptimes.com

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