WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. — The Palm Beach County Sheriff's Office is awaiting final paperwork before Tim Ferriter is moved from a jail cell to a prison cell.
Ferriter was incarcerated at the West Detention Center in Belle Glade as of Monday, but his next destination will be at a prison operated by the Florida Department of Corrections.
That's because a Palm Beach County circuit judge has denied a request seeking to let Ferriter out of jail while he awaits an appeal of his conviction and prison sentence.
Ferriter, 48, was convicted in November on charges of child abuse, child neglect and false imprisonment.
Prosecutors convinced jurors during Ferriter's trial that he treated his 14-year-old adopted son like a prisoner in their Jupiter home, forcing the boy to sleep in an 8x8 windowless room in the garage with nothing but a mattress, a desk and a bucket in which to defecate. The only time the teenager was allowed out was to go to school.
Ferriter was sentenced to five years in prison, but his attorneys asked Judge Howard Coates to allow Ferriter to be placed on house arrest pending his appeal.
In their Nov. 20 motion, defense attorneys William R. Ponall and Prya Murad claimed that Ferriter had two job offers if he were to be released. One such job offer was a sales position at Mazda of Palm Beach, they wrote.
However, an attorney representing Mazda of Palm Beach told WPTV in a Nov. 29 letter that a letter suggesting Ferriter had a job waiting for him was a "complete and unequivocal forgery."
That led defense attorneys to amend their motion and set the stage for a Jan. 11 hearing in which Ferriter's friend, Collin Ziemerink, testified that he was "familiar with the letter but that he was not involved with its preparation or creation."
Ziemerink testified that "it was his wife, Jolene, who actually prepared and signed the letter after ostensibly having a conversation with their housekeeper, whose husband worked at Mazda." He went on to say that it was their housekeeper who provided the information for the letter to his wife, who "typed and prepared the letter based on such information."
"Mr. Ziemerink unavoidably acknowledged during his testimony, now, that it would have been better for Jolene not to have typed the letter and signed it," Coates wrote in his Jan. 14 order.
Ferriter also testified during the hearing that he wasn't involved in the phony job offer, but Coates wrote that he didn't find Ferriter's testimony "to be particularly credible or persuasive."
Coates also expressed doubt that Ferriter's attorneys "made no effort whatsoever to confirm the validity or legitimacy of the alleged employment opportunities or to have even a modicum of a conversation" with Ferriter about the subject.
Citing "a clear and concerning lack of confidence in the trustworthiness" of Ferriter, Coates denied the request, writing that Ferriter "has demonstrated a persistent pattern of deceptive behavior intended to misrepresent and conceal his actual financial assets, prospects and capabilities from the court."
Coates went on to write that the prosecution of Ferriter's wife, Tracy Ferriter, was "caused in part by the fallout from the circumstances caused by the fraudulent Mazda letter."
"Notably, shortly after the circumstances of the letter were revealed to the world and after the denial of Mrs. Ferriter's attorney's motion to withdraw because of a pending job offer for the attorney, Mrs. Ferriter's attorney then renewed her motion to withdraw to raise an irreconcilable conflict that involved conduct and circumstances unrelated to the attorney's employment opportunity," Coates wrote.
In the end, Tracy Ferriter had to find another attorney to represent her, delaying the scheduled start of her trial in January. She faces the same charges for which her husband was found guilty. Her trial will now begin in July.
Coates also granted a request from the Palm Beach County Sheriff's Office to vacate an order requiring that Ferriter remain in a county jail, clearing the way for Ferriter's pending prison transfer.
Sheriff's spokeswoman Teri Barbera said Monday that the office is working with the Department of Corrections to facilitate the transfer of custody.