Dead man’s mother upset over sentence

Polly Peak says a sevenyear prison sentence is too long for Lontrelle Durham, who was found not guilty of murder in her son DaJuan Peak’s drowning.

Durham, 20, received that punishment because he was convicted July 15 on fleeing and eluding and grand theft auto charges tied to the drowning case.

“I feel bad he got seven years,” Peak, of Delray Beach, said in a recent interview. “But we all knew some time had to come out of this, because wrong is wrong. They shouldn’t have run from the police.”

Still, Peak said she never thought Durham should have been labeled a killer in the Nov. 5 death of his 25-year-old best friend, during an attempt to get away from sheriff’s deputies in the town of Lake Park.

Prosecutors wanted Durham to get at least 10 years behind bars on the remaining two charges, after failing to get a conviction on a first-degree murder count.

Circuit Judge Charles Burton opted for a shorter term, while expressing frustration with Durham’s devastating decision to speed away from law enforcement officers.

But Durham remains in Palm Beach County Jail, as prosecutors on Aug. 23 filed another third-degree felony charge.

He and three other inmates are accused of battery in the July 4 beating of another prisoner in the jail’s recreation yard, records show.

The alleged victim in the new case, a 36-year-old West Palm Beach man, suffered a broken nose and an eye injury.

At Durham’s trial in July, prosecutors said he was to blame for the drowning because he drove a stolen car carrying Peak into a retention pond.

The jury decided Peak, also from Delray Beach, made his own decision to try to swim away from the cops following the crash.

Peak’s death was ruled an accidental drowning.

“It’s a tragic accident, but it is not a criminal act by Mr. Durham,” Assistant Public Defender Elizabeth Ramsey said during her closing argument to the jury.

The events unfolded as agents staked out the Emperor’s club, 8340 Resource Road, to arrest Peak on a warrant for armed robbery and aggravated battery charges

At about 3 a.m., Durham and Peak took off from the parking lot in a Volkswagen Passat that belonged to Durham’s then-girlfriend’s mother.

Durham drove east on Park Avenue, ran the traffic signal at Congress Avenue, and continued until crashing the Passat through a barrier and into the water. As the car began taking on water, both men pushed themselves out of windows.

They tried to swim away from the shoreline where several deputies stood and called out to the pair before entering the dark water themselves.

Peak struggled and went under, but Durham, who had six prior criminal convictions, was pulled safely out of the pond by deputies.

Judge Burton framed the case as another example of a societal problem with young people fleeing from police, perhaps because of a lack of trust.

“For whatever reason, people run from the cops and bad things usually happen,” he said.