interesting and disturbing information. >> reporter: troubling data according to the civil liberties union. nonhispanic blacks cited more than white drivers. >> if you talk with any african- american or person of color, the common term that you hear or phrase is driving while black and brown. >> reporter: the aclu says the report based on numbers provided by local lawsuit to the state. and in some counties the disparities are more glaring. according to the report, blacks are four times more likely to be pulled over and cited for not wearing a seat belt than whites. in palm beach county, three times more likely. orange, 2.8 times more likely. with numbers from 2014 showing tampa police officers issued 575 citations to black motorists compared to 549 to white motorists.

safety regardless of any race. if we see someone not wearing a seat belt, we're doing the over examine citing them or giving them a warning. >> reporter: the aclu's joyce henry claims that tampa police has not been consistent in reporting numbers which the department disputes. >> we sent the report to chief eric ward. and we -- in all fairness to him, the information was sent to him yesterday evening. so last night. >> reporter: okay. and tampa police does assure me that the chief is taking a look at that report. in 2005, the florida seat belt safety law required law enforcement to report these statistics every year. chambers, abc action news. we're just getting breaking news into the news room.

issue will be on the november ballot. morgan's group united for care was able to gather enough signatures to put it before voters for a second time. it failed to get the needed 60% support to pass back in 2014. well, stormy weather moving through the bay area most of the day. take a look at the conditions right now. this is a live look at the sunshine sky way bridge. just look at all of that fog. hard for drivers to see out there. the question now, will we see more wet weather through the evening? for that answer we turn to chief meteorologist denis phillips. >> it's a cloudy raw day. and drizzly with that fog. dense fog advisories just off shore. most of that is staying off shore. definitely an issue for the bridges. if you live in pinellas county, you can see the fog move in making visibility practically zero. you still have the rain as well. scattered showers across the area.

not posing a major threat. the severe threat earlier today was down south. that is no longer our concern. once this rain clears out, then we've got some changes for your weekend forecast. changes i think you're going to like. we will take a closer look coming up in a couple minutes. >> see you shortly, denis. the weather much worse in south florida tonight where multiple tornadoes did damage. one twister in coconut creek overturned cars in a parking lot and another damaged the roof of broward college. here is what people said after the storms moved through. >> crazy, crazy, crazy. very crazy. you see what is going on. luckily no one got hurt too bad. >> a lot of loud bangs. now that i see what the destruction was, the sounds make sense. >> one person suffered minor injuries as a result of the storms. 15 dump trucks are on their way from florida to washington, d.c., the mission to help in

friendly invitation. take a look at the dump trucks wrapped with this image, encouraging people to come visit florida. top administrators in turmoil in the polk county school district. employees once felt scared to come to work for fear that a top administrator would lash out them. laura harris is outside with how this trickles down to students there. lauren. >> reporter: we have learned that associate superintendent greg rivers was under investigation. he is one of those top administrators that oversees operations in your child's school. we have learned that some of his employees felt afraid to come to work and his employees also say that he promoted someone who they didn't feel was qualified for the job. may 16th, 2014, facilities planning coordinator pam luce writes a desperate e-mail. i haven't been able to go back to work since greg's latest

i can't sleep or eat. i am petrified of going to the same building where he is. superintendent leroy brought in an outside investigator to look into rivers' conduct. they didn't want to get on rivers' list that he had a temper and was verbally abusive, making them unsure and fearful during work. they also accused him of having an inappropriate relationship with an employee, promoting her when she was not qualified. rivers responded to the employees' claims saying he was working on saving money. he was not giving an employee special treatment and those allegations were the result of slander and gossip. he also admitted to using profanity but apologized afterward. le roy put this letter in his personnel fire and ordered him

leroy orders had i am to work on his communication skills. signed this letter. ever disciplined him. >> reporter: and to make matters more complicated ton, rivers recently filed a complaint against leroy a few weeks ago. it's unclear what is in that investigation. but we do expect a full report and those findings come early next week. live in bartow tonight, lauren rozyla, abc action news. >> a sarasota man in serious trouble tonight after deputies say he stole $47,000 worth of fentanyl from a pharmacy. investigators say he swiped 12 boxes which contained a total of 288 doses of fentanyl spray. deputies say after he was caught, he admitted to the theft. a mother and daughter are attacked inside their home

deputies say the 53-year-old brutally attacked his ex- girlfriend and her mother in the silver thorn community. both women are expected to survive. he was captured and charged with home invasion robbery and two counts of aggravated battery with a deadly weapon. neighbors say this opens up security concerns. >> what is lacking? how did this person get in? what do we need to do to make this a safer environment? >> just about half an hour, some of those concerns may be answered. there will be a community meeting with the shave at 6:30. we reached out to the company that owns silver thorn for a response but have not had any return phone calls. tonight serious concerns at a bay area hospital after a man kills himself inside the emergency room. this following a serious car crash early last night. take a look. surveillance video shows bill adams in a black truck turning in front of a car at us-41 and powell road. emergency responders rushed to get him to the hospital and say

he had a gun and it's not their job to check for one. fire officials say patting down anyone could even be a liability. their protocol is to get an officer to check for guns if they see anything suspicious. new developments in a crash involving a deputy. investigators finally charging the man who she say dragged deputy tim burg down the road. cooper is charged with dui and 12 counts of dui with property damage. three days before christmas, deputies say cooper hit the officer's motorcycle and dragged him down the road and hit six other cars before finally coming to a stop. millions of dollars will be pumped into the poorest neighborhoods in south st. pete to pay for infrastructure improvements and develop job training properties. they have pinpointed ten programs that will receive parts of the initial half million dollar tax fund.

interest to the city is workforce development. an led tech company has developed a program that aims to get people in the community back to work. so far it has been a huge success. >> it has been wonderful. it changes the whole direction of people's lives. >> oh, i learned a lot. i learned a lot. it helped me stabilize myself. >> this is all part of a 30- year plan to redevelop the south side of the city. it's a community that city administrators admit has been underserved. to learn more head to abcactionnews.com and click on this story. well, tonight you have a chance to help name the newest school in pasco county. elementary w as it's called right now is scheduled to open in august. you can submit your suggestion with a brief explanation until february 29th. for specific details on how to do that, just head to the as seen on section of our website on abcactionnews.com. still to come, dumped by the donald. his feud with fox news getting deeper.

getting if he skips out on tomorrow night's debate. >> i don't want the police department telling me how to parent my child. a father arrested. the punishment that almost every parent has handed out to their child that landed this man in jail. and a lot of clouds out there as our live drive is out and about with more clouds than clear. but that will be changing later tomorrow. we will have that forecast for you and extend it through the weekend as abc action news

>> turning now to democracy 2016. bernie sanders meeting with president obama as donald trump and fox news feud gets more heated. >> reporter: bernie sanders got a little taste of the white house. with a few staffers and his wife, he met with president obama in the oval office. more than an hour later,

wing telling reporters that he had a constructive and productive meeting with the president. >> domestic issues, occasionally a little bit of politics. >> reporter: did he ask for an endorsement. >> of course not. >> reporter: a new "washington post" poll shows his rival, hillary clinton leading sanders nationally 55 to 36%. sanders has cut the lead to the smallest in an abc poll. today clinton it in iowa rallying support in a bowling alley just days before the first votes are cast. >> you get the first chance to speak up in the entire world about what you're looking for. >> reporter: on the gop side, a very public rift between donald trump and fox news is boiling over again. trump's campaign says he is skipping the gop presidential debate on fox this thursday. >> i won't be doing the debate. >> reporter: the real estate billionaire took to social media blasting megyn kelly, the same fox news anchor that he

debate. trump's chief rival ted cruz challenge trump to a one on one debate. >> if he is unwilling to stand on the debate stage with the other candidates i would like to invite donald right now to engage on a one on one debate with me any time between now and the iowa caucuses. >> reporter: fox news insists that trump is still welcome at the debate tomorrow night. >> a texas father in trouble with the law for doing something that every parent will do, confiscating his daughter's cell phone. he found a text that he thought was rude. but when his ex-wife found out to get the phone back. he was given a citation. after a year and a half of refusing to hand the phone over, a warrant was issued for his arrest on theft charges. >> why would you need to arrest that. don't have you have better

>> jackson got the last laugh. a judge found him not guilty due to a lack of evidence. and by the way, he still has the phone. well, get this, a man is facing charges tonight after a federal authority says he tried to smuggle live birds into florida in his pants. yeah. not kidding. take a look. he was a passenger on a flight from cuba to florida. customs and border patrol agents took him into custody in miami. he was hiding six exotic birds in a fanny pack. an exotic animal that gave a 99-year-old woman the scare of her life is back with its owner tonight. the woman was sleeping in her home on sunday when she woke up to find this guy named banana curled up right on her chest. >> i don't know. i guess her first impression was that might be a cat.

at each other, they both freaked out. the lady screamed. the animal took off and went into the attic. >> yeah, i would freak out too. the woman's daughter and her friend were able to lure the mysterious animal out of the attic. the opener saw what happened in a news story and was reunited with her today. apparently she had been missing for over a week. now the most accurate weather team in florida, abc action weather. you never see those kind out in the open. that. >> nope. >> i would be so freaked out. >> it looks like one of those cats that don't have hair. >> the hairless chinese. >> something like that. >> look outside. the live drive. there it is. yeah. well, the live slow-go because bridges. but at least the dense fog is giving way at least part of the

you look over at the sky way and you can see that sea fog out there. it's common out there. as the gulf cools into the 50s where it is right now. 57 degrees. you get the warmer air on top. it creates a pea soup kind of fog. if you're out on the water, visibility nearly 0. we are still picking up rain across the southern counties, across most of the metro, palm harbor right over to downtown, back to bloomingdale and east of lakeland, you continue to see showers. same thing right on to lakewood ranch and down to fort myers and naples. that's where the rough weather was earlier today. i think the severe threat pretty much over for us. maybe not so much for south florida tomorrow. but i just don't think there's enough energy. we have temperatures in the 60s right now and all day. you typically don't have all of the dynamics or energy that you need for severe weather. tampa, 68. clearwater 65.

all areas showing rain. we hit 68 today. that's really not that far from normal in tampa. but by next week, i think we're back around 80 degrees. not necessarily long-term. got a nice january thaw, florida style. this is our january thaw, by the end of next week. i think it will be closer to groundhog day, the early part of february. there's a look at the rain overnight through today. most areas picked up an inch. some cases two, maybe even three inches of rain. down south, in broward county, there was an ef-1 tornado. minor injuries in coconut creek. not as strong as the tornadoes the last few weeks that we have had but still caused issues. there's a possibility tomorrow that there could be more severe weather down across the southern third of the state. if you look at futurecast, as far as i'm concerned right now, our severe threat is pretty much over. the rain is going to linger for the first half of the day. look what happens by late tomorrow.

in in the morning and the afternoon, by tomorrow evening we get the clearing and the cooler weather. it gets breezy and i think friday we're back to the 60s for highs. but not as nearly as windy as the last go around. in terms of the national scene, you can see all of that tropical moisture coming in from the sub tropical jet. that's very indicative of an el nino situation. that's not changing any time soon. there's all of that cold air. we're going to see the fringe of that tomorrow and again on friday. 60s for highs. we won't be getting close to what we had last weekend. there's a look at the 7-day. the rains tomorrow mid morning through mid afternoon. no severe weather out of it. friday looks beautiful. 64. gas april alooks even better. sunny and 66. back near 80 by early next week. hello, folks. the lightning are talking a good game.

this is aa must win before the all-star break. john sabol has more from the arena. >> reporter: steven and ben this weekend. for the rest of the bolts they days. the lightning can think of that >> you don't want them looking ahead. we have a job to do tonight. about to go on. count. >> reporter: the bolts have won 13 of their last 20 games. but still they find themselves stuck in a log jam in the standings. entering tonight, 7 points separate ten teams, including the lightning. >> we're going to play a desperate team. not going to give up a lot. we have to make sure that we play our way. >> the leafs are 43 points or whatever. this is a game we should win. well, they play hard. they get shots.

>> a big game for us. we try to get on this roll again. not having that letdown. sometimes when you have a big win streak, you can let it get away from you after you lose that first game. it's important to get this one before the break. >> reporter: reporting with the lightning, john sabol, abc action sports. all right. i get the feeling that the usf women are still upset about losing last week. houston comes to town tonight and they feel the wrath much like ucf did last saturday when they got beat by nearly 40. the wren are look for their second conference win in a row. mcmurray had exploded on the scene. he scored 30 in that houston victory. he was named acc freshman of the week. and he has quickly brought a smile to head coach orlando. >> his growth, his leadership, how he continues to improve, his decision making on the court are the things from the

you see that continues to get you excited. >> well, we will see what happens. we're baback in a minute and

>> so there's a look at the weekend. hey, that looks great for gasparilla.

late morning, the weather will be beautiful. not nearly as windy. last weekend would have been miserable. we have coverage of the top stories on abcactionnews.com. and we will see you back here at 11:00.