A woman accused of threatening to kill Atlantic City's mayor and his family was released with conditions Thursday, with the promise she will take a bus back to New York.
But Nicole Staton was concerned with how she would get that bus home, since she has no money, she told the judge.
She asked if Jewish Family Services or Volunteers of America would be able to buy her a ticket.
"I have no money," she told Judge Sara Beth Johnson.
Staton, 47, is accused of confronting Mayor Marty Small as he drove in the City Hall parking lot Friday, banging on his window and then making threats to him and his family.
While the charges list her living at the Turning Point Day Center for the homeless in Atlantic City, she said she lives at the Red Roof In in Binghamton, N.Y., where she also has two warrants she said she needs to address.
Staton said her cell phone along with other belongings were stolen and she could not afford a ticket home.
Her attorney, Kate Weigel, said she would reach out to JFS to see about getting the ticket while Staton was being processed for release.
But when the judge told Staton she could not go to Atlantic City as a condition of her release, she noted she would have to get the bus there.
When the judge said she could go to the bus station to leave, Staton then questioned about going to the VOA to get help with the ticket.
Both the judge and Weigel explained to Staton several times that that would be worked out for her without having to go to the Pennsylvania Avenue location that would place her near City Hall.
Assistant Prosecutor Deirdre Laws argued for detention, citing Staton's criminal history that includes a first-degree cruelty to children conviction for which she served four years in prison, and an assault on a law enforcement officer last year.
Weigel acknowledged her client has some mental health issues, saying there was a clinic Staton could go to at home. Johnson made that a condition of her release.
