Marion County Sheriff Billy Woods had zero patience for media games Thursday when a reporter tried to hijack a press conference about a major child predator sting to ask about an unrelated Florida Highway Patrol lawsuit.

The press conference was called to announce the results of “Operation Bad Habits,” a six-day undercover operation conducted in early June that resulted in 58 child predators being taken off the streets, the largest such sting in Marion County history.

Detectives posed online as children ranging from 7 to 15 years old (and sometimes as parents) to lure sickos looking to meet kids for sex. Suspects showed up with condoms, drugs, and cash offers as low as $150. Multiple arrests included human trafficking charges.

Among those busted: a second-grade teacher, a youth football coach, fathers, a high school student, and both legal and illegal immigrants. Sheriff Woods didn’t mince words about the evil they caught.

“Now here in Marion County, we take a very aggressive, proactive approach to this, no holds barred, because I want to find every one of these pieces of shit and get them out of my county. It’s a wide scale of individuals. Pure evil is what it is. We caught illegals, legals, immigrants, fathers, coaches, even a student.”

He specifically called out one coach who arrived with a child seat in his vehicle.

Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier and Florida Highway Patrol Colonel Gary Howze joined the sheriff at the podium. Uthmeier noted that since taking office in February 2025, his office has helped take down nearly 1,700 child predators statewide and vowed to prosecute every single one of these 58 cases to the fullest extent.

But the real fireworks came when a reporter, after asking a couple of questions about the sting, suddenly pivoted and tried to drag Attorney General Uthmeier into questions about a completely unrelated case involving a woman named Lindsey Isaacs who is suing the Florida Highway Patrol over a wrongful arrest in a deadly I-4 crash.

Sheriff Woods immediately shut it down.

“Alright, so you just pissed me off. Out of all this shit, you want to ask him about some other case? We’re talking about children.”

He continued, making it crystal clear where his priorities were:

“It doesn’t make a difference. I’m not here to talk about what FHP did. I’m here to talk about what they did. Nothing else. This press conference is solely for those pieces of shit that are right there.”

WATCH:

“This press conference is solely for those pieces of sh*t who are right there!”

Marion County Sheriff Billy Woods exploded on a reporter who ignored the subject of his press conference — a sting conducted to capture child sex offenders — and asked about an unrelated case. pic.twitter.com/ZoCGHlqXSK

— Breitbart News (@BreitbartNews) June 12, 2026

Jim Hᴏft Jim Hᴏft is the founder and editor of The Gateway Pundit, one of the top conservative news outlets in America. Jim was awarded the Reed Irvine Accuracy in Media Award in 2013 and is the proud recipient of the Breitbart Award for Excellence in Online Journalism from the Americans for Prosperity Foundation in May 2016.

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