Cops: Dog pees, owner pulls a gun

BOB MUDGE

Senior Writer

VENICE — A woman who brandished a gun after being confronted about where her dog urinated was arrested by two different agencies.

Molly Lynn Godoy, 53, Venice, is charged with two felonies, including aggravated assault with a deadly weapon without the intent to kill, a felony; and violation of probation on an original charge of battery on a law enforcement officer.

She’s also charged with resisting an officer without violence.

She was incarcerated by the Venice Police Department and the Sarasota County Sheriff ’s Office on Tuesday.

She’s being held without bond. She has a hearing in early October.

The VPD has petitioned for a temporary risk protection order requiring Godoy to surrender any guns in her possession. Through the Public Defender’s Office, she pleaded not guilty to the resisting an officer charge.

No plea has been entered as to the other charges.

According to a probable cause affidavit, an officer responded Tuesday to a report a woman “pulled a firearm.”

The victim said they confronted a woman in a golf cart about letting her dogs urinate in the victim’s yard.

The victim’s affidavit states the woman asked the victim if one of the dogs had urinated and, when told it had, replied, “Well, at least it’s not poop.”

When the victim told the woman to leash her dogs or they would call the county, the woman yelled “F--- you.”

The victim went into their garage. “Maybe two (minutes) later, I hear something so I turn around and I see her point something at me and I hear ‘You better watch out,’” the affidavit from the victim states. “I couldn’t see anything so I start to walk outside towards and I realize she’s holding a gun as she holds it up and keeps pointing it at me.”

The woman repeated “You better watch out,” so the victim ran to their phone to call 911, it states.

The woman, later identified as Godoy, left the area and was tracked down by a deputy.

The deputy’s probable cause affidavit states he yelled, “Stop, Sheriff ’s Office” twice at Godoy, but she continued walking to the store.

He grabbed her from behind to keep her from entering the store, it states, and she tensed up and tried to “flail her arms.”

It states when the deputy used a leg sweep to take Godoy to the ground, a black Ruger pistol fell out of a pocket purse, and she tried to grab it and hide it under her body despite instructions not to reach for it. The deputy was able to push the gun out of her reach, it states.

Possession of a weapon is prohibited by the terms of Godoy’s probation on a 2024 charge of battery on a law enforcement officer.

In that case, officers responded to a report of a crime and found her “intoxicated to a point where she could not care for herself,” a VPD probable cause affidavit states.

She was taken into protective custody under the Marchman Act, it states, but was released, returned to Venice through Uber and later the same day tried again to report a crime.

The affidavit states she was intoxicated, had “the strong and distinct odor of an alcoholic beverage” and admitted to drinking wine on the way home.

Unable to get into her house, with no family in the area who could care for her, officers attempted to take her into

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Godoy

from C1

protective custody again.

When they did, the affidavit states, Godoy tensed her arms, pulled away and dropped her body weight, then feigned a medical episode and tried to kick the officers.

She also attempted to bite one, it states, kicking him after she was handcuffed and brought to a standing position.

After she was cleared medically at the scene, the officer intended to take her to a substance abuse treatment facility, but she kneed him in the groin and was placed under arrest.

She pleaded guilty to battery in February and was sentenced to 24 months of probation that included a ban on the consumption of alcohol.

She was prosecuted in July for violating that condition, admitted the violation and had her probation modified to include attending AA meetings three times a week.

According to court records, Godoy pleaded no contest to DUI charges in 2015 and 2022.