ST. JOHNS COUNTY, Fla. -- A St. Johns County Sheriff's deputy and spokesperson has been fired from the force.
Sergeant Catherine Payne was arrested last week following an Amber Alert for her son.
Payne was arrested when her 6 year old child was reported missing and she was with him.
Monday, a pre-disciplinary hearing was scheduled at the sheriff's office so that she could present her side of the story, but she never showed up.
Payne has been on house arrest at her St. Augustine home since she was released from jail last week.
"I never in a million years thought there would be an Amber Alert," Payne said.
She said her attorney told her she had a right to be with her 6-year-old son, Reid, and so that's why Payne went to his school last Tuesday and picked him up.
However, it violated a court order that her estranged husband, Philip Payne had asked for. The order said she could not be with their son alone.
However, Catherine Payne told First Coast News she did not know about the order prior to picking up her son.
"I knew I had a legal right to my child and my attorney told me," Payne said.
But her husband's attorney, Brandon Beardsley said a document shows the court order was hand-delivered to her two weeks prior.
Still, Catherine Payne said her husband's accusations that she was leaving the state with the child were not true.
"If they had done their due diligence, they would've know I had to stay right there because I had appointments with me and my son the next morning," Payne said.
Payne and her son were having dinner in Fernandina Beach when she was arrested for interfering with child custody.
Payne, now under house arrest, is wearing an ankle monitor. She said she received some troubling news Monday morning from a person with the monitoring company.
"According to her, I violated my probation orders by leaving my house, even though I'm GPS'd and I'm sitting right here," Payne said while sitting on her back porch.
Payne noted that because of that call, she could not leave the house at all -- even for a pre-disciplinary hearing with the sheriff's office Monday afternoon. In that meeting, she could present her case to an official panel, according to a spokesperson with the St. Johns County Sheriff's Office.
The spokesperson also said provisions were made so Payne could legally attend the hearing. When she did not show up, a decision was ultimately made to terminate Payne for six sustained violations of policy.
Payne maintains her eight-week administrative leave was due to chronic medical issues not physiological issues. Her goal is to get her son back.
"Yeah, I'm crazy. I'm crazy about a 6-year-old little boy and I would do anything for him," Payne said.
Payne is starting her own public relations firm in St. Johns County.
