PENSACOLA NEWS JOURNAL

Tuesday May 20, 2015

It seems - for the moment at least - that "Hovindication" has come to pass.

In a pair of court orders issued Monday night, Pensacola evangelist Kent Hovind was granted a motion for judgment of acquittal in connection with a March contempt conviction, as well as had three counts of mail fraud and associated conspiracy charges dismissed.

The orders, signed by Chief Judge M. Casey Rodgers, indicated that the grounds for the dismissals and the pending acquittal were primarily based around the language of the charges against Hovind.

Rodgers ruled that the government's indictment was not specific enough in explaining how Hovind had broken the law. The charges were dismissed without prejudice, although the government could potentially refine them and bring them against Hovind again at a later date.

In regard to the contempt charge, a jury had previously found Hovind of guilty of violating a court forfeiture order when he filed paper work saying the ownership of nine properties the government seized from him was still in question.

Rodgers found that the forfeiture order did not specifically prohibit Hovind from filing paperwork in relation to his seized properties.

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