An 81-year-old woman in Florida has been taken into custody after she allegedly used pepper spray on two young girls and their mother, reportedly because the children were playing with bubbles.
April Morant, the mother of the 3- and 6-year-old girls, revealed to WESH that her daughters were enjoying their bubble play in their own yard in Ocala, staying clear of the fence that marks the boundary with Ada Anderson’s property. According to Morant, Anderson suddenly shouted a racial slur and then leaned over the fence while holding an object in her hand.
“I thought she had a gun,” Morant recounted. “I was really startled because she leaned over the fence like this, and I couldn’t immediately tell what she was holding. I looked quickly and before I knew it, she sprayed it.”
Morant said the family has had problems with Anderson since they moved into the neighb orhood last November.
“I feel like she’s escalating,” she said. And now, she said, “Bubbles. Literally. The bubbles put her in a whole other arena whatever going on with her mind.”
She said Anderson has hurled insults and slurs at the family “since day one,” and she shared a video with WESH in which a woman shouts a racial slur.
Anderson did not respond to attempts for comment, but she is heard on body camera footage of the arrest asking “when do I get the pictures back that I can show you what they’re doing?” She also told the officers they had no right to arrest her.
An affidavit says that Anderson told deputies the children were “running up and down the fence and yelling at her” so she sprayed the mace at them from her front porch, which is about 40 feet from the fence, and said the mace did not hit the girls, according to Law&Crime. The 6-year-old told deputies that it did and that it made her “nose hurt.” The deputies also noted remnants of the mace on the fence and said that it irritated a deputy’s nose and throat.
Anderson was charged with three counts of battery, second or subsequent offense, and released on a $6,000 bond. She is due in court again on July 1. Records show that she was previously arrested on aggravated assault and stalking charges in 2019 and 2017. The assault charge was related to another neighbor dispute, but prosecutors declined to pursue the case.
Morant wolt WESH she’s now seeking a restraining order and raising money to try to move away.
