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The height of kittens season is just around the corner for those of us that live in Volusia County and that means pregnant cats are everywhere. Male cats are out and about traveling longer distances to impregnate as many females as they can.

Computers! They sit on your desk or lap and quietly drive you completely insane! If any of you have noticed my absence recently you can chalk it up to computer defiance.

DELTONA -- A 1-year-old boy drowned in a backyard swimming pool late this afternoon in Deltona. He is the youngest of six pre-school-age children to die in pool drownings this year in Volusia County.

The Volusia County Sheriff’s Office was dispatched to 754 Leeward Drive after receiving a 911 call at 5:18 p.m. reporting that the baby had been found at the bottom of the pool, agency spokesman Gary Davidson said.

The baby, Chase Wilson, wasn’t breathing when he was removed from the pool. The child’s mother and father and a grandparent were at the house at the time of the incident, Davidson said.

"A Sheriff’s Office telecommunicator coached a frantic family member over the phone on CPR procedures while help was quickly sent to the house," Davidson said.

DELTONA -- The obvious question as to how a 1-year-old Deltona boy ended up in the bottom of a family pool with such a tragic ending has been answered: "The mother was in the kitchen preparing dinner and lost sight of the child briefly," Volusia Country Sheriff's spokesman Gary Davidson told NSBNews.net.

The Sheriff's Office is continuing its investigation into the drowning of the baby, identified as Chase Wilson.

Davidson said he did not have the mother's name or those of other immediate family members readily available and that the circumstances surrounding the drowning were explained to him by one of the investigators.

The baby is the youngest of what are now six small-child pool drowning fatalities in Volusia County this year.

The Volusia County Sheriff’s Office was dispatched to 754 Leeward Drive after receiving a 911 call at 5:18 p.m. reporting that the baby had been found at the bottom of the pool. The victim wasn't breathing when he was removed from the pool. The mother and father and a grandparent were at the house at the time of the incident, Davidson said.

NSBNews.net file photo / Dr. Tom Omby, shown in this photo earlier this year in a Daytona Beach courtroom with then-Bert Fish Medical Center CEO Bob Williams, is among several members of the hospital district's board replaced by Gov. Rick Scott. Omby was chairman. 

NEW SMYRNA BEACH -- A metamorphosis of the Southeast Volusia Hospital District governing board is on the fast track with Gov. Scott on Wednesday announcing the immediate appointments of Joseph Benedict, Patrick E. Corbett, and Harold "Derwin" Smothers as members whose terms run through March 15, 2015.

Courtesy graphic / Rain could be the biggest weapon deployed by firefighters today in quelling the local wild fires, including the biggest -- the Maytown Road Fire that straddles Oak Hill and Osteen with 2,397 acres burned since June 13. That fire is 90 percent contained. Click on the attachment below to see the spate of wild fires across the Sunshine State.

NEW SMYRNA BEACH -- The Volusia County Council has extended the declaration of local emergency for seven days.

I am heartsick and outraged that another innocent child has drowned in a family swimming pool! Where were the parents?

NEW SMYRNA BEACH -- An on-duty officer behind the wheel of New Smyrna Beach Police Department's signature Dodge Charger on South Glencoe Road was issued a ticket Saturday after slamming into an eastbound State Road 44 motorist's car, wrecking both vehicles and injuring the other driver who was transported by ambulance to the hospital with minor injuries.

Likisha Slayton, 28, of Edgewater was released from Bert Fish Medical Center's emergency room later in the evening. Slayton was eastbound on S.R. 44 when she was T-boned by the cop car heading into the intersection from South Glencoe Road with the intention of turning right onto the main road from Glencoe. The Florida Highway Patrol issued police officer Mark Severance a ticket charging him with failing to yield the right of way at the stop sign on Glencoe. The FHP could not ascertain if he actually came to a complete stop and then proceeded into the intersection.

Courtesy photo / Bloodshed in a Pierson home was not a suicide as first believed, but murder with a live-in girlfriend charged with shooting her boyfriend to death.

PIERSON -- Audra Anderson She initially claimed she had just woken up and wasn't sure what had happened, insisting that her boyfriend, 38-year-old Robert Wood, must have accidentally shot himself. But with Wood succumbing to his injury, Volusia County Sheriff's investigators further questioned her about the details of the shooting that occurred shortly before 9 a.m. Saturday morning at the couple's home on Buckles Road.

"Anderson told investigators several different stories, eventually admitting that she fired the fatal shot that killed Wood," agency spokesman Gary Davidson said.