Court Upholds Life in Prison For Teenager
By Paul Pinkham, Times-Union staff writer
Originally published in The Florida Times-Union, February 7, 2002
At 14, Joshua Phillips was old enough to be sentenced to life in prison without parole for the 1998 murder of his 8-year-old Jacksonville neighbor, Maddie Clifton, an appeals court ruled yesterday.
A unanimous 2nd District Court of Appeal affirmed the first-degree murder conviction and sentence of Phillips. The court refuted defense arguments that sentencing a 14-year-old to life without parole was cruel and unusual punishment.
Phillips' attorneys asked the court to revise his sentence to life with a chance of parole. But the court said that while that argument had merit, it was up to the lawmakers.
"Only the Legislature can create a sentence of life imprisonment with the possibility of parole for a juvenile convicted as an adult of first-degree murder," the appellate court said. "There are strong arguments in favor of the penalty Mr. Phillips proposes as well as strong arguments in opposition. … However, public policy concerns about a juvenile's degree of culpability, potential for rehabilitation and appropriate punishment are best resolved by the people's representatives—the Legislature."
State Attorney Harry Shorstein, who prosecuted Phillips, said he wouldn't mind having a less stringent sentencing option for judges to consider in cases like Phillips'.
"I oppose mandatory sentences and the Legislature's tying the hands of judges and prosecutors," Shorstein said. "No matter how tough you are on crime, you can't say a 14-year-old is the same as an 18-year-old."
Phillips was arrested in November 1998 after the girl's body was found stuffed under his water bed. She had been missing a week, prompting a massive community manhunt in her Southside neighborhood.
Only two possible sentences—death or life without parole—apply to people convicted of first-degree murder in Florida, and the state Supreme Court has declared the death penalty off limits to defendants younger than 16. That left life without parole the only possibility once jurors convicted Phillips.
"It was an extremely heinous crime and an unbelievable loss not just to the Clifton family but to the whole city of Jacksonville. All of our hearts were broken," Shorstein said. "Without lessening the severity of the crime … I definitely would not have been upset with a sentence less than life without the possibility of parole."
