Anthony Todt (Law&Crime)
A quadruple murderer who killed his entire family and their dog in Florida has filed a federal lawsuit against the jail that housed him for over two years because it released a letter he wrote to his father to the media.
Anthony Todt, 48, murdered his wife Megan, 42, along with his 13-year-old son Alek, his 11-year-old son Tyler, and his 4-year-old daughter Zoe, plus the family dog in the idyllic Disney town of Celebration in December 2019.
A jury convicted him of four counts of first-degree murder and one count of animal cruelty in 2022, and a judge sentenced him to life in prison. The case gained national attention not only because of the brutal nature of the murders but also because his father murdered his mother when Todt was a young boy.
According to his lawsuit, Todt wrote a 27-page letter to his estranged father in June 2020. Jail employees scanned the letter for any illicit activity before mailing it out.
“In this highly publicized and sensationalized case, the relationship between Plaintiff Anthony John Todt and Plaintiff Robert Todt was publicized and of ‘tabloidal’ interest,” the lawsuit said.
The Orlando Sentinel published a story about the letter after the newspaper obtained a copy through a public records request. In the letter, he blamed his wife for the murders. Several other outlets, including The Associated Press and Law&Crime, also wrote about the letter.
“Long story short, she gave them the Benadryl/Tylenol PM pie, separated them, woke up at 11:30 [p.m.], stabbed and then suffocated each one,” Todt wrote in a letter, according to the Sentinel. “At the news of this, I ran to the bathroom and puked — I was weak.”
Todt claims the release of the letter violates his due process rights and was subject to an unlawful search and seizure. He said the jail “seized” the letter without a court order, and prosecutors tipped off reporters about it. He names the Osceola County Sheriff’s Office, Osceola County Jail, then-Sheriff Russell Gibson and other officials in the lawsuit. The State’s Attorney’s Office told his father it could not speak with him about the letter because it was part of an ongoing investigation when he inquired about it.
“The privacy and confidentiality of the evidence could not be discussed but the letter could be released to the Associated Press, the internet and several national news organizations of publication,” the lawsuit said.
The agencies and people named in the lawsuit have yet to respond.
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