continues right now at 5:30. >> this marion county teenager helped lure her ex-boyfriend to the home where he was murdered and his body burned. it's been five years since the virgs attack -- vicious attack and the suspect was sentenced for a second time. >> rocked ocala, and eyewitness news as followed every single development. jackson's ex-girlfriend was granted the second trial because she wasn't properly read the miranda rights. live now along southeast 53rd avenue in ocala, where jackson was murdered and tim, seth's mom told the judge today, her son's killer was lucky to get life. >>reporter: seth's mom says the 19-year-old is lucky that her son's killer will not have to suffer the same fate that seth did. five years ago, he was asked to meet up right here on 53rd avenue, here in marion county.

and never came back. sonya jackson will never see her son get married or even his driver's license. five years ago, her 15-year-old son's remains were founded in paint cans, at the bottom of this lime quarry. >> someone can be rehabilitated, i believe they should be severely punished. >>reporter: amber wright is the main reason that seth jackson was murdered. during this morning's sentencing, wright asked the judge for mercy. >> i deserve to be punished, but i also deserve a second chance. >>reporter: in 2011, deputies said wright, her boyfriend, and several other friends, lured seth jackson to this trailer. where they beat him, shot him, and burned his body. seth and wright had recently broken up and prosecutors say the only reason seth came to the trailer was because wright told him to. >> she is the driving force, because no one makes amber wright do anything she doesn't want to do.

gave wright life in prison for the second time. wright had already been convicted in 2012 but the trial was overturned because she was not properly read her miranda rights. sonya jackson hopes this is the last time she'll have to ask for justice. >> she deserves to spend a lot more time in prison for what she's done to our son. >>reporter: prosecutor's say wright's boyfriend was the master behind of jackson's murder, he's the youngest person on death row. reporting live in marion county tonight, tim barber, channel 9 eyewitness news. we are staying on top of breaking news right now out of volusia county, the crews are fighting a wildfire that is burning dangerously close to homes in new smyrna beach. blaine is live off of ropers way and the flames are out, but there is still a lot of smoke. >>reporter: still quite a bit of smoke, the forestry service is out here working, very close to having this fire 100% contained.

they had a spot -- the fire burned beyond where he this planned to burn, they're dealing with dry brush like this out here. when you grab this stuff, you can hear it, it just crumbles right in your hand out here. we're near roper way and buckhorn road. sky witness was over the scene earlier today as the fire burned. within a few hundred yards of a few of the houses out here. none of them were actually damaged. no one was in harm's way out here. but it was a square ri moment for some of the residents here. what you're hearing right there, a brush truck still heading out there to tend to this fire. and again, what they said happened is they were doing a prescribed burn, there was a spot over, and when they were trying to put it out, one of the tractors got stuck out here, which is why it did burn out of control. things seem to be calming down out here. we'll keep you update as they continue to work. live here in osteen, channel 9 yns news.

misleading videos and questionable claims. tonight the republican race moves out west. florida senator marco rubio still looking for his first win. channel 9's christopher heath joins us live and the experts is says the race is for second place. >>reporter: donald trump is expecting to have a big event. for the only man to beat trump, ted cruz, a dead heat right now with this man, that would be senator marco rubio. rubio has been picking up florida endorsements ever since jeb bush dropped out. he's not expected to finish better than second place. >> wow, this is great. >>reporter: republican candidates making a final push with voters in the first in the west state of nevada. >> you wake up this morning of the news that the president is planning to close gaun tan month. >> close the detention center.

woour not giving back an important naval base. >>reporter: and in las vegas last night, front runner donald trump going after ted cruz. >> this guy is sick. there's something wrong with this guy. >>reporter: even a protester in the crowd. >> like the to punch him in the face, i'll tell you. >>reporter: ted cruz trying to recover from a campaign shakeup and can refocussing his efforts on trump. >> it's easy to say you want to make america great again, but the question is, do you understand the principles that made america great in the first place. >>reporter: cruz recently fired his top campaign spokesperson, rick tyler, after tyler released a misleading video that seeped to show marco rubio disparjing the bible. cruz has since apologized with rubio kaes camp calling it another dirty trick. we won't have final numbers from nevada until late tonight.

until super tuesday when 11 states will vote. as for florida, we don't vote until march 15th. bob and martha. >> we'll l have to be patient. thanks, chris. meanwhile, the democrats have their sights set on saturday's primary in south carolina. >> experts believe hillary clinton will easily win by double digits over bernie sanders. sanders hit the campaign trail in virginia today, putting down the idea of wall street and billionaire campaign donors, saying they have an unfair advantage. >> these guys have endless amounts of money to do what they want to do. they do not have me and they're never going to have me. >> the recent e-mail scandal, she was secretary of state. a new road construction project created an unexpected traffic jam in u one melbourne neighborhood. vehicles poured into the neighborhood trying to get around a portion. lee wood forest community is located in the same area as that

brevard county bureau reporter saw the confusion firsthand, as drivers attempted to get back out of the neighborhood. >>reporter: the county tells me it's had message boards posted for a couple of reports. many drivers made it all the way up to the construction, only to turn right into a residential neighborhood. today, pine hill drive in melbourne looked like a thoroughfare, they tried to knave gait around the construction. -- navigate around the construction. this neighborhood is not part of the posted detour. >> it's ridiculous, i mean, it's been semis like that all day long. i mean, i counted over maybe a 100 cars in ten minutes. >>reporter: this driver passed us for a third time, on lee wood boulevard. >> there's thousands of cars turned off wick ham, into communities and there's no signs. you don't know are to go. >>reporter: a county spokesmen

posted a couple of weeks ago, warning drive drivers about -- drivers about the construction. the county is installing a drainage culvert and making storm water improvements to reduce the risk of flooding. getting there. >> i appreciate what it's going to mean for the hurricane season, you know, over there for flooding, but it doesn't help us here on this side. with no sidewalks. >>reporter: the county recommends that drivers heading south of wick ham road turn on aurora, next right on galley boulevard. drivers should go on -- left on -- left on aurora, and right back on to wick ham. >> hopefully it slows down. >>reporter: the flow of traffic slowed after construction crews out here told drivers that this turn behind us here, was just for local traffic. reporting from brevard county, melanie holt, channel 9 eyewitness news. covering marion county, three deputies are off the job

>> we told you two of these cases had to do with drugs. the other deputy quit amid accusations he was conducting bogus traffic stops and searches. channel 9's myrt price is live at the sheriff's office, and you asked what they're planning to do to keep incidents like these from happening again. >>reporter: yeah, we talked to sheriff's officials about these incidents, and others, and can they say they're planning to ramp up their case review process so when they find cases of misconduct, they'll continue to hold deputies accountable. deputy kimberly brays was accused of using drugs at a house party. she covered up for bray. both resigned when they found out they were being investigated. the state attorney's office began investigating another deputy. bustamante. they say cases like this one, that were caught on video, where they say he found a gun in a bag, but they say he lied op i a report and conducted an illegal

evidence of excessive force and that the deputy conducted bogus traffic stops. we told you about other cases like this one, where deputies were suspended for lying on a report about searching a hotel room for a suspect. and this one, where deputies were accused of lying about what happened this arrest. about a dozen deputies over the past few months have been fired, resigned or disciplined for misconduct, including being dishonest. >> the greater majority of these incidents, the sheriff's office has identified the issues and made sure that the community was aware. >>reporter: we asked why the sheriff's office wasn't notified southeastern. >> we're talking 50,000 incident reports a year mrut 24,000 report -- plus 24,000 reports, hundreds of hours of video needs to be reviewed. >>reporter: officials say they have added more measures in place to hold deputies accountable. >> we have begun an audit

them. >>reporter: now, officials say they will continue this review process and they say they want the community to trust them. they say the reason for that is because when stuff like this happens, they say instead of hiding it, this put it out there so people will be able to see what they're doing to fix it. live in marion county, myrt price. >> unkord a. and apple's fight to stop the fbi from unlocking a terrorist phone intensifys. where the battle could be headed next. >> new home buyers blame defective stucco for rotting wood and bad mold and there could be thousands. >> i'm scared, i'm afraid. >> next, which local homes are suspect and how to detect early damage. >> and i'll show you new pictures in of tornadoes right

they bought their homes new, 5-10 years ago and they are rotting away and they blame stucco. >> cracked due to the stucco, rotting wood and mold f. todd reports it could be a billion dollar statewide problem and many owners are just now discovering it. >>reporter: rotting wood, easily shredding inside of town home walls just five years old. testing here, found water intrusion in many homes, their engineer blames defective stucco. >> i'm scared, i'm afraid. i'm afraid that it's not safe to live here. >>reporter: bonnie. >> one bedroom can't be used. >> i keep an inhaler next to my bed.

homes refuses to make repairs. >> it doesn't take responsibility. i mean, people's lives are at risk. >>reporter: several communities now face stucco nightmares. his stucco bubbled and cracked and repairs haven't fixed his home. he blames the construction boom from 2004-2010, that was not properly super vised. >> if you've got to cut corners along the way, that's what happened. >>reporter: many home builders used watered down stucco and applied the concrete coating way too thin. >> and water works its way up underneath, starts decaying the wood and once it starts decaying the wood, it continues to up and up and up until the entire wall is rotted out. >>reporter: what seems alarming now, there were no stucco inspections by regulate torss during construction, so it was up to the builder to get it right. one structural engineer told a

time defects could add up to a 1 billion dollar stucco nightmare, statewide. >> across the board, in all of the inspections that we do, every single builder, that we've investigated, has the same stucco issues. >>reporter: repairing stucco defects could cost 50,000 or more for each home. >> i'm stuck with it. >>reporter: now, it's committed to resolving washtty issuess and finding -- warranty issues and finding solutions. structural warranties and the homes must be maintains. taking questions on the story, you'll get a notification when todd is live. the number of zika cases rise, 5 of those right here in central florida. we told you seminole county got the first confirmed case of the virus. brevard county and osceola each has two.

became infected while travelling and the virus is not in the local mosquito population yet. how similar it is to the common cold, i've posted the differences on my martha sugalski wftv facebook page, share the story with your family and friends. home owners in a deltona neighborhood are fighting a sidewalk on their street. they say if pavement is poured along blue stone, it will uproot trees that have been growing there for decades. the city plans to put in 25 miles of sidewalks over the next two year asks any negative feedback will not change their plans. they've already budgeted for the sidewalks. nice sunset. >> beautiful here. >> tomorrow. >> not so good tomorrow. as a matter of fact, over a dozen tornadoes reported so far, pretty widespread damage, louisiana now moving in towards hattiesburg, mississippi, but we're on the quiet side of this storm, at least for the moment. right now, we're still in the mid 70s, down from 80s earlier today. we had a breeze out of the

showing up on early warning doppler 9 radar, 1 million watt severe weather tool, which will get a workout tomorrow. fast-moving severe storms, closer to the lunch hour. this is what's going on back here tonight. big el nino enhanced winter storm system, we've had several reports of tornadoes, a particularly dangerous situation, tornado watch, this is like the most intense watch that we have, because we are expecting more widespread tornadoes, if fact, already had damage, i have several of these on my twitter feed. damage that's near baton rouge, to a gold's gym, damage that moved over one of the highways also. future track shows several tornado watches in effect tonight. we will likely have more watches extended farther east. this is 11:30. this will be the focal point. watch out here in the gulf of mexico. daybreak tomorrow morning, the slight risk across central florida, the worst weather will be north, but we're going to be watching these scattered storms p going all the way down -- developing all the way in the

tomorrow. so basically quiet tonight. you've got a good evening ahead. tomorrow morning, 9:00, out to work and school, relatively quiet, with the clouds increasing. here comes scattered storms through here. again, we will see some likely thunderstorm wind gusts over 50 miles per hour. from palm coast, daytona, apopka, orlando. closer to the lunch hour, then push approximating through our eastern zones -- pushing through our evening zones 2:00 and 4:00. make sure you download the free severe weather center 9 weather app. on the main wftv facebook page, a facebook live event, you can ask questions about what's going on with tomorrow's weather. the closer we get to tomorrow, late morning, early afternoon, slight risk of tornadoes, and more likely strong wind gusts over 50 miles per hour. could also see some higher rain totals over an inch in a few spots, after all of this rain, finally moves out of the picture. here's your five-day forecast with you weekend always in view. the temperatures show up -- if i

chance is going up tomorrow to 80%. basically dry through sunday. sounds good, we'll see you at 6:00. >> breaking for eyewitness news at 6:00. what the investigators are doing to figure out what fuelled this deadly feud. >> i never broke the law. >> he has a history of alleged drug use, witness intimidation and stalking charges. new at 6:00, what this orange county commission candidate revealed to us, about his checkered past. and this the 15-year-old is accused of trying to kill a

developing tonight, apple is vigorously defending it opposition to a federal court order to break into the iphone of a suspected terrorist. channel 9 anchor jorge estevez is following this story, and jorge, a very important voice many the tech industry, is not backing apple in this public fight. >>reporter: no, microsoft co-founder bill gates says he doesn't agree with apple's ceo who says creating software to break into the phone would put people in jeopardy. thousands of apple supporters are expected to rally in 40 cities nationwide, telling the fbi don't break our phones and what they call a fight for the future campaign. >> this goes far beyond this single case or this single phone. >>reporter: a judge has ordered apple to unlock san bernardino terrorist sayed farook's phone. an intense battle between tim coke and james couplemy.

security of hundreds of millions of law biding people. but he responded in an open letter, we don't want to break any anyone's encryption or sent a master key loose on the land. investigators believe critical evidence may be on the killer's phone, and have the support of many of the victim's families. >> there might be some information in that phone that could lead to any other terrorist plots. >>reporter: microsoft founder bill gates says he think thes there's a way am can turn over specific -- apple can turn over specific information. >> should anybody ever been able to tell the phone company to get information. >>reporter: gates says this case should be left up to the courts and congress. apple's ceo is asking the fbi to seek legislation and sort through this difficult issue.

apple's stance on it. and george, new this hour, palm bay police are warning residents about an on going lottery scheme that could cost you big-time. a winning fifth to the victim or ask the victim to claim the winnings for them. they ask to hold money or valuables as a deposit, and then the suspects disappear. tomorrow, job seeshg can meet with 30 -- seekers can meet with 30 employers at a job fair in orlando. the double tree resort near sea world orlando. at 10:00 a.m. applicants should dress professionally and not bring children. we put a link on our website to register. for eyewitness news at 6:00. >> we are monitoring a home where a mother is accused of killing her son. for six, what investigators hope to learn when they search the place. >> plus, this deputy was run down and nearly killed on the job, what she told us about the punishment for the teen who

and the allegations of misconduct that (phone ringing) you can't deal with something, by ignoring it. but that's how some presidential candidates seem to be dealing with social security. americans work hard, and pay into it. so our next president needs a real plan to keep it strong. (elephant noise) (donkey noise) hey candidates,

channel 9 eyewitness news continues right now at 6:00. >> police say this mother turned on her own son, and carried out a plot to kill him. >> shot him multiple times while he was in the shower. >> now she's headed to jail, charged with murder. the clues the police hope to uncover inside of their home. altamonte springs police have just started searching the family home. >> at 5:00, you heard from neighbors concerned for this mother, when they noticed her rapd weight loss and tonight, the investigators are looking for a motive. channel 9 is live at the scene

inside of that home will hold more clues into this murder. >>reporter: and they've just started searching that home, in the last 20 minutes or so, we watched them wait for that warrant for the last five hours. now, police say when they arrived here around noon today for a welfare check, the were concerned that son was in grave danger, and they found the mom with a handgun and the son dead in the shower. >> there's a lot to do in this investigation. >>reporter: but already, altamonte police have done a lot. arresting 59-year-old virginia ortega and charging her with premeditated murder. >> miss ortega planned the murder of her son, blake howard. and again, shot him multiple times while he was in the shower. >>reporter: they were led her by a call from a relative who spoke to ortega and grew concerned for the safety of her son, blake howard. >> virginia ortega, confronted one of the officers with a handgun, in hand. >>reporter: after that confrontation, they asked her to drop the gun, she did, and that's when they found her son dead in the shower.