In an emotional session in the Ninth Judicial Circuit Court of Florida on Tuesday, First Baptist Orlando’s longtime Pastoral Care Minister, Bill Curl, forgave the man who fatally battered his wife during a home invasion earlier this year. The man pleaded guilty to the crime and was sentenced to life in prison.
Ronald Davis, the 55-year-old man who admitted to killing Lucy Pat Curl, the 85-year-old wife of Bill Curl, in January, changed his not guilty plea to guilty as part of the plea deal, telling Judge Leticia Marques that it was the right thing to do.
“The defendant has taken from us our [m]atriarch. My wife, 64 years. Happily all the time. She’s been the one, the glue that kinda holds our family together,” Bill Curl said in a statement to the court about the impact of his wife’s murder on his family, according to NBC News affiliate WESH 2.
Still, he sent Davis to prison with a gift of forgiveness and hope in Jesus.
“I would say for him, we have nothing but forgiveness, for love, for a hope that his life has a better quality, and one day he’ll come to know Jesus," the First Baptist Orlando pastor told ...
