>> and the hulk hogan sex tape trial is now in the hands of i'm rod carter. >> i'm stacie schaible. thank you for joining us. >> thousands of people turned out today for the funeral of hillsborough county deputy john kotfila jr. he died in a terrible crash saturday after putting his squad car between a wrongwgway driver and another motorist. mark douglas was there and joins us now live. mark, i was there with you today. there were moments of both sadness and pride for this young deputy who literally gave his life to save someone else's. >> reporter: yes there was rorod. this was an impressive turnouout. died at the age of 30 years old. barely starting his law enforcement career. he was a deputy who carried out his oath to serve and protect

it was a bittersweet sound. they paid tribute to john kotfila jr. >> i'm proud t to call him a hero. but a lilike of men and women in the room, he was not defined by one moment in time. >> reporter: master deputy gary herman thought of him as a son and said the man who put his patrol car between a wrongway driver and another motorist saturday morning was always ready to help others. >> and that is what made him a true hero. not because of how he died, but because of how he lived. >> reporter: he comes from a family of cops in california and police from that state showed up in droves for his funeral. his mother and father sat quietly next to his casket while his sister said good-bye.

down here on earth, but gained another one up in heaven. >> reporter: this family lost a sun, but gained the gratitude of a community and the respect sworn to serve. >> it was in his dna. that is why he became a cop. >> reporter: it is in his family dna in fact. the deputy comes from a long line of law enforcement officers back in massachusetts now. no doubt, many of those officers will be at his grave site for a final salute. rod? >> mark, standing out there and seeing all of those ofofficers and hearing literally the silence and seeing that respect shown by the officers, it was extremely moving. >> reporter: absolutely. this is a man who gave the ultimate sacrifice. he gave his life to protect a stranger in the line of duty. if that does not make him a role model for other officers,

but that kind of sacrifice, i'm not sure what does. >> yeah. the word hero i is thrown around a lot, but today that word fits. mark douglas, thank you sir. a fiery plane crash at peter o. knight airport left two people dead this afternoon. fire crews were on the scene within minutes but there was little they could do. the airport is located on davis island and newschannel8's chip osowski is there with the latest. chip, i understand that a witness told you another aircraft may have actually been involved? >> reporter: two witnesses have told me the same thing. they saw one airplane taking off. another one on the ground in flames. authorities have yet to confirm if another aircraft was involved. investigators spent houser at the crash site documenting and photographing the scene. trying to figure out what

the crash happened shortly after 11:30 on davis islands. >> we have several general aviation airports. these are part of the aviation authority airports. then there is a plane crash, faa investigate it is crash. >> reporter: general aviation airport meaning pilots don't communicate with a tower, but with each other on a common frequency. when fire crews arrived just minutes after the crash, the plane was engulfed in flames. >> made access onto the firefighter procedures. and, it was not a very large fire at the time. control. and then we proceeded with a search for any victims in the surrounding areas. it was confirmed that we did have two people who were ththe aircraft. >> reporter: the ntsb confirming the plane ththat

aircraft careful of holding a pilot and five passengers. this particular flight was bound for an airport in pensacola. the faa and ntsb are investigating the cause of the crash, though investigators have cleared the scene for the evening. authorities have yet to release the names of those who were killed in the crash. >> chip osowski, live on davis island. very sad. thank you chip. the hulk hogan sex tape trial is in the hands of the jury. they are being asked toto decide if showing the videdeo on a wewebsite was an invasion of figure. jeff patterson has been covering this for us from the very beginning. >> it becomes what they have described as a defining story. >> reporter: in closing arguments, the attorney for terry bollea told the jury they only published the sex tape

>> he said we don't have privacy rights. >> reporter: hogan's team is trying to draw the distinction between terry bollea the man and hulk hogan the character. >> you know hulk hogan. he is on stage. part of the act. but, he wears it because he is self-conscious about the size of his head. >> reporter: the video shows him in a very private moment. >> this has never been about anything more than ththe fact that gawker took a secret private sex tape of my client >> reporter: but gawker's attorney asked why it was never shown during the case. >> the very one that mr. bollea claims was so bad, the one that was so devastating. is suing for. >> reporter: he contends the

bad. >> here, nine secondnds of sexual activity. dark grainy video, that's it. >> jeff patterson says we are expecting hundreds of pages of documements to be released in this case. we expect the documents will contain depositions from bubba revealing. we will certainly pass along that information to you. and brace yourselves, a loud weekend is in store at the macdill air force base. the thunder birds and the para commandos are set to perform. now the big question is, will the weather cooperate? for that answer, let's go to chief meteorologist steve jerve with your air forecast forecastst. >> reporter: we definitely have some challenges especially for saturday with the clouds and showers. maybe a thunderstorm mixed in.

all day long, but that chance of showers does exist. take a look at the forecast for saturday. tempmperatures are fairly warmment the possibility of a passing shower generally. the air force and the patrollers are aware they can dealal with some type of weather out there for your knowledge. might be a good idea to bring along an umbrella or a slicker in case it decided to rain. sunday looks better. breezier and cooler. you can see why we are forecasting the possibility of rain as weather moves from west to east. ththere are a lot of showers and thunderstorms along the northern gulf coast. this is a cold front. so later on sunday, we are thinking the rain will end d in the mornining hours on sunday. it will be sunnier by the afternoon turning breezier and cooler. it will be windier too.

>> you can check the radar using our storm team 8 weather max app. it is free to download atat the app store. a parking nightmare. one of sarasota's most popular tourist spots. >> business owners and the city are proposing a solution that comes at a cost to drivers. how you could end up footing the bill. >> and a gator out on a stroll comes dangerously close to children. but they sat there watching anyway. we will tell you what it took

>> a sheriff deputy is out of a job and behind bars after he attacked a seven-year-old girl. the girl told investstigators the deputy ryan ferguson put liquid handnd soap in her mouth because she lied about something. after r that, he threw her to the ground, choked her and hit her several times in the face. saint armands circle is one of the most popular tourist destinations in sarasota, but it is often a parking nightmare, so they are proposing a parking garage, however, there is a catch. they want to put up parking meters to pay for it. city commissioners are going to vote on the project in their meeting on monday night.

public is welcome to come in and share their opinion. > good news for at&t customers here in hillsborough county. the company is expanding its 4g network. customers in downtown tampa, busch gardens and macdcdill can now get faster internet in more places. reading. writing, math, alligators. >> the gator was at school but didn't belong. >> we will show you what it took to wrangle the reptile after this. >> that plus your storm team 8 forecast coming up.

i think we should've taken a left at the river. tarzan know where tarzan go! tarzan does not know where tarzan go. hey, excuse me, do you know where the waterfall is? waterfall? no, me tarzan, king of jungle. why don't you want to just ask somebody? if you're a couple, you fight over directions.

if you want to save fifteen percent or more on car insurance, you switch to geico. oh ohhhhh it's what you do. ohhhhhh!

>> an unexpected visitor showed up at a lakeland school. >> watch out, it's crawling right toward you. >> we have incredible video of it being captured. melissa moreno joins us live in lakeland. you can see the students right there melissa. >> reporter: right. and with no fear. the alligator came from this football field. went over here in front of the school and it was all caught on cell phone video. why did the alligator cross the football field? to get to this lakeland school. >> an another teacher came in and there was a gator walking across the field.

inch gator showed up at the geneva classical yesterday. the teacher captured it on her cell phone. >> the kids were so ecstatic to see an alligator come to school. >> reporter: police believe the e reptile was headed for a lake acrossss the street, but instead, did a u-turn right toward the school. >> that is when i got nervous. this is going to become an emergency. >> reporter: they waited for a trapper to arrive holding it by a patrol car. you can see wildlife trapper scott wrangled the reptile while student and staff watched in amazing. >> barefoot? >> the best pair of shoes god gave me. they dry out quick and they fit every morning. it is great. and they haven't worn out yet. that's the good thing. >> reporter: just another day for him.

season of alligators walking around. >> reporter: but one these students won't forget. >> it is crazy. >> reporter: you can watch the entire videos. they are pretty cool. they are on our website, wfla.com. stacie? >> amazing stuff. boy. i like that best shoes got ever game him right? [ laughter ] thanks melissa. fred flintstone never wore shoes eitherer. all right, some blue sky here mixed in. 77 degrees. air temperatures,75 degrees. not too bad temperature wise.

spring begins officially on sunday. the vernal equinox when the sun is directly over the equator as summer begins in places like michigan and new york and montana. spring officially starts at 12:30 a.m. we get really hot here in florida. 66 degrees at 7:00 a.m. still on the warm side. at 3:00 p.m. scattered thunderstorms are possible. we can't rule out a morning shower either. that chance is there all day. you can see a morning shower. we will see how this thing develops. the bulk of it should be later in the day into sunday. 70s mostly in pinellas county. temple terrace, 81. 79 degrees in north port. 75 weeki wachee. at the high levevels of the atmosphere, we have had a lot of high clouds controlling along in the subtropical flowow. the west.

and, we do have a front that is essentially stalled as a stationary boundary to the north. this area of low pressure will travel along the boundary and kick up a few showers. that is why we are forecasting the possibility of rain. across the statate now, quite a few clouds. there are some breaks though. so it hasn't been a bad day overall. just a few more clouds than out of towners would like. so we can't rule out the possibility of an evening light drop of rain here or there including the overnight too. back to our west in the forecast, on the rpm overnight, extra clouds around. maybe a shower for us. the thinking is that on and off thing we keep talking about. partly to mostly cloudy skies with maybebe a few showers beginning. we did see a bit of a break there saturday afternoon accocording to this particular model. as this cold front approach it is area, and, attached to that front likely, sures showers and maybe a thunderstorm.

we work the heavier shower activity. then we start to see the clearing take place with high pressure built in. breezier, sunnier, an cooler. you can see the temperatures will drop just a little bit. that will carry all the way into monday and tuesday, too with this feature of high pressure bringing in the northerly flow. as that high shifts, we will start to see a warmup as you will see in the seven day forecast. pollen is high. it will be for a little bit here. saturday, sunday, monday, if you are sensitive to that. you will feel it. should be a nice one. temperature wise. maybe a light shower. forecast for tomorrow, 50% chance on and off through the day. but especially as we were talking about later in the day for possible thunderstorms front. there is a chance of a passing shower at the air show itself. cooler. monday looks great. early next week, fantastic. warming through the 70s all week. a good friday with the rain

>> not a washout. >> i don't think it will be a washout. >> the upside, it wiwill help with the pollen. >> yes. any rain at all would hehelp. >> thank you. well, coming up, ththe bolts sound off on their fifth loss in six games. >> yeah, and the rays lose their closer. find out why brad will be out of the lineup and how long he is going to be gone.

>> the bullpen has been an area of concern for the tampa bay rays. it is an area of concern. brad is expected to miss at

the club felt it was best to address the issue now. he made 41 saves last season earning his first all-star appearance. general manager matt silverman says they will go with closer by committee for now. a group that includes danny farquar. >> we feel good about it. we will feel better when we get brad back. >> i just want to make the team more than anything. you know. and if things fall into place, and you know, somebodydy wobbling would be lying to you if they out games. the rays battling the bo sox. board. hank conger scores. next inning features a screening of logan's run. logan morrison gave tampa bay the lead which the staff held.

shutting down the bostonon threat. in the fifth, brad miller. yard. well. therefore, the tampa bay lightning are not well. the bolts were out-shot by the stars 17-4 in the third period last night. a lackluster effort that allowed dallas to come back and win 4-3. the bolts lose for the fifth time in their last six games. >> it is a little puzzling to be honest. the guy ins the room have to hold themselves accountable. we were doing everything right two periods. we have to be better than that. >> it is tough. wash it up as one of those nights where the pucks didn't go your way. >> finally, quick check of the ncaa women's basketball tournament.

the 5-12 matchups are always dangerous come tournament time. alana. they led by as many as 17. florida falls apart in the fourth allowing albany to go on a 15-0 run. some great ball movement with a layup and they take the lead with under two to go. and wouldn't give it up. albany earns its first ever win in the ncaa tournament upsetting florida. upsets have been the name of the game today. a 15 over two for the eighth time in history. my bracket is completely busted. >> you were doing good the. >> i was seven for seven. >> then it was all done. >> i had michigan state winning the thing. >> this is my bracket now. >> well start over. [ laughter ] >> i need to get to the gym apparently. >> i think so. . all right. >> we get the point. >> don'n't go anywhere. ninightly news is coming your way next. >> then we are back at 7:00.

have a fantastic friday everybody. let t me help you with that.

breaking news tonight. one of the most wantedd terrorists in the world captured. the only surviving plotter from the paris massacre taken alive in a dramatic raid in brussels. tonight how they found him and what he can tell investigators. spring snow storm. a big nor'easter bearing down on millions right as ththings are supposed to be warming up. targeting trump. mitt romney's big announcement as hee tries to derail the front-runner. also a scare for trump's family. threats to his children. dangerous mix, the new warning about a spike in patientnts unknowingly sabotaging their own life-saving treatment because of something they don't tell their doctor.