Charges Dropped Against Retired Surgeon, After Arrest in Turks and Caicos

Charges against a retired Sarasota doctor and another American tourist arrested at an airport in the Turks and Caicos have been dropped, after pressure from Washington, D.C., and negative publicity from the media.

Retired Sarasota neurosurgeon Horace Norrell, 80, and Dallas businesswoman Cathy Davis, 60, were jailed, after airport searches allegedly found a single bullet in each of their luggage. 

The two arrests came on back-to-back days. Each had to post $4,000 cash bail to come home.

Each had to hire lawyers to get out of jail, and had been expected to return in June for a hearing.

Norrell has suffered health problems since the incident, and required a pacemaker implant after collapsing upon his return to the U.S., according to the Sarasota Herald-Tribune.

“Both these folks had to go through a horrible ordeal,” U.S. Sen. Bill Nelson said Friday.  “I hope we can still find out how a bullet they say was not theirs got into their luggage.”

Nelson's office receive a press release from the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions in the Turks and Caicos Islands that states: “After a review of the available evidence and taking into account all the circumstances, it is the decision of the Director of Public Prosecutions to discontinue the criminal proceeding.” 

Nelson had reached out to Ambassador Janice Jacobs, the assistant secretary of state for U.S. consular affairs, asking if these arrests were “a shakedown of American tourists.”

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