Did they really need the helicopter?

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Boater accused of tossing girlfriend into water

Police use Taser to subdue Rockledge man

BY VICTOR THOMPSON
FLORIDA TODAY

¯COCOA¯, Fla. - Police arrested a Rockledge man and accused him of pushing his girlfriend into the Indian River from his sailboat. The man then held off police as he sailed south.

Donald Becker, 50, was charged with aggravated battery domestic violence and resisting arrest without violence for pushing Pamela Grassy overboard near Oleander Point around 9 p.m. Thursday.

Grassy, who had been living with Becker for three years, swam to a dock at Riverside Drive and was pulled out of the water by Cocoa Police officers.

She was not injured but was tired from swimming, police said.

Becker triggered a standoff when he refused to come out of his sailboat. Cocoa SWAT and marine units as well as a Brevard Sheriff's helicopter followed the sailboat as it floated south on the Indian River to about Park Avenue in Rockledge and ordered him to come out.

The standoff ended at 11:42 p.m., when Cocoa Police steered close to Becker's sailboat and shocked him with a Taser stun gun.

Becker was taken to the police department before being booked at the Brevard County Detention Center.




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