UPDATE: Cara Ryan has just received a $500,000 bond. She also must surrender her passport.
Original story
Largo, Florida -- A Clearwater High School journalism teacher has been charged with second degree murder in the shooting death of her ex-husband, a retired St. Petersburg Police sergeant.
The shooting happened over the weekend in Indian Rocks Beach on 1st Street North.
Initially, detectives investigating the circumstances surrounding the shooting held off filing charges against Ryan despite the fact they were certain she had pulled the trigger.
In a press conference Friday, Sheriff Bob Gualtieri reiterated that saying the one thing they can say with "100% certainty" is that J.J. Rush was shot by Cara Ryan. He said she shot him once and he stumbled to a neighbor's house where he died. The bullet entered his left arm and traveled into his chest.
Rush and Ryan married in 1997 and divorced nine years later in 2006. They got back together again in 2007 and remained in an on-and-off-again relationship until they separated again in February. Ryan has been a teacher at Clearwater High School since 2009 and has been a teacher for 24 years.
"The relationship between Rush and Ryan appeared to be one where there was very significant control by Cara Ryan over J.J.," Gualtieri said.
Gualtieri said examples of this revealed through the investigation include the fact J.J. was not allowed to have his own bank account, all money he earned went into an account that was fully controlled by her, if he went out to lunch he had to turn a receipt to her showing her what he spent money on.
Press Conference: Cara Ryan arrest
A shift in that relationship happened when J.J. moved out on Feb. 15.
Two days before his murder, Gualtieri said Cara had learned J.J. had taken her off of his bank account.
On Saturday night, investigators say J.J. got a text from Cara that was sexual in nature inviting him to come over to her apartment. The last thing detectives know for sure is that while J.J. was there Cara received a text from a man she is seeing and that's where Gualtieri says the story "goes in a 100 different directions."
Ryan initial story to detectives was that J.J became upset over the text and he then sexually assaulted her and she shot him out of self-defense. Then she continued to make conflicting statements and starting changing her story. In each case, none of the physical evidence coincided with what she told detectives.
Detectives continued their investigation and through various investigative techniques probable cause was developed for her arrest. Gualtieri said detectives believe Ryan was "acting out" because she was losing control over him, knew she was losing control over him and he was exerting his independence.
Just before his death, Rush, 45, had been working in the forensics unit with the St. Petersburg Police Department after retiring as a sergeant from the department following an on-duty car crash in 2005. He leaves behind a 21-year-old daughter from a former marriage.
