Corrections officer: Wrong man in jail for son’s death
Woman seeking mercy for West Palm Beach man. Judge said case had strange set of facts but tied his hands.
WEST PALM BEACH — For more than 10 years, Linda Tomlinson has lived with the painful knowledge that the wrong man was sent to prison for her 25-yearold son’s murder while his real killer was allowed to go free.
She has written letters. She has talked to prosecutors. She has testified in court. All to no avail.
“I never got any justice for Eric,” said Tomlinson, who as a corrections officer for the Palm Beach County Sheriff ’s Office has spent 20 years making sure criminals remain behind bars.
Next week, in what could be Tomlinson’s last chance for a small measure of redress, defense attorneys will ask a Palm Beach County judge to have mercy on Christopher Dean, a 38-year-old West Palm Beach man who is serving a life sentence for Eric Flint’s 2005 murder.
“Let him go. Why not? He’s served 13 years,” Tomlinson said of the man who was convicted of second-degree murder even though he didn’t lay a hand on her son. “If I could just save one kid out of this whole situation it would honor my son’s death.”
But like everything surrounding the bizarre case that has befuddled judges, including Florida Supreme Court justices, nothing is simple.
Unless prosecutors agree that Dean should get a chance to one day live outside prison walls, Circuit Judge Karen Miller will have no choice but to hand Dean the same life sentence he received in 2008 when a jury convicted him of felony murder in Flint’s death.
At that time, then-Circuit Judge Jorge Labarga expressed dismay that his hands were tied. Because Dean had been released from prison on a charge of fleeing from police less than three years before Flint’s death, prosecutors insisted that he be punished as a reoffender, which forced Labarga to hand him a life sentence regardless of whether he thought Dean deserved it.
“This case presents the strangest facts and set of circumstances that I’ve witnessed in my 28 years as a lawyer,” said Labarga, who was later elevated to the Florida Supreme Court. “But I have no choice in the sentence, unfortunately.”
Few would dispute Labarga’s characterization of the case.
The events that led to Flint’s death began shortly after noon on Jan 12, 2005, when he and Dean broke into Gregory Marlow’s apartment off Village Boulevard. The two were surprised when Marlow came home for lunch with his girlfriend. Dean and Flint fled — Dean in a car and Flint on foot.
Marlow jumped into his girlfriend’s Suburban and pursued Dean onto Interstate 95, according to a Florida Highway Patrol investigation. As the two careened through traffic at speeds reaching 100 mph, Flint jumped over a fence that separated the apartment complex from the interstate. When Dean saw Flint along the highway, he stopped his Maxima to let his friend jump in. Marlow, following behind, plowed into Flint, killing him instantly.
Tomlinson said prosecutors promised her that Marlow would be held accountable for her son’s death. But, after a jury convicted Dean of second-degree murder because Flint’s death occurred as a result of the burglary he committed, prosecutors said it was too late.
“Originally I had considered charging Mr. Marlow with leaving the scene involving death, however, due to the murder case taking almost four years to prosecute, the statute of limitations for this second-degree felony has expired. I cannot proceed on this charge,” then-Assistant State Attorney Ellen Roberts wrote Tomlinson in a 2008 email.
Further, she said, Marlow claimed he acted in self-defense. Florida law allows people to use deadly force to protect themselves. “The prosecution of Mr. Marlow would fail,” Roberts concluded.
Just before the collision, Marlow claimed Flint reached into his pants. Believing Flint was reaching for a gun, Marlow said he ducked down. He said he didn’t even know he had hit Flint.
In his investigation, FHP trooper Anabel Monroig said Marlow made no mention of a gun when he was talking to police dispatchers, who repeatedly told him to abandon the chase. In a chilling moment captured on the recording of his 911 call, Monroig said there’s a noise “that appeared to be (Marlow) crashing and running over something.”
When the 911 call continued, Marlow didn’t mention he was involved in a crash. Instead, Marlow went home and parked the damaged Suburban behind his apartment.
Later, during an interview with West Palm Beach police, Marlow insisted he thought Flint was reaching for a gun. To avoid getting shot, he said he slid down and didn’t see the crash.
“I see the dude do like this and I ducked down,” he told police. “As I ducked down I don’t know what happened. I got back up. I know I ain’t in the road so I swerve back in the road and I peel. I go back to the house and make sure, make sure my girl all right.”
During a deposition, he repeated the claim. “I was scared,” he said, explaining why he didn’t stop. “I just thought I seen a guy pull a gun. I was trying to get as far away as possible.”
Despite Marlow’s claims, Trooper Monroig recommended that prosecutors charge him in connection with Flint’s death. “Gregory Marlow was criminally negligent,” he wrote. “The fact that (he) was pursuing a subject that burglarized his residence does not relieve him from the duty to operate his vehicle with due regard for life. (Marlow’s) reckless actions caused the death of Eric Flint.”
Roberts, who last week remembered the case as a complex and difficult one, said she simply had no evidence to pursue Marlow. She specialized in vehicular homicide. She said she had no idea why homicide prosecutors dropped the case on her desk. Officials declined comment.
She said she knew Tomlinson was angry and reached out to her. “I am truly sorry for your loss and I pray that time helps to heal your pain,” Roberts wrote in the 2008 email.
“I don’t need you to pray for me,” Tomlinson said, bristling at the memory. “I need you to do your job.”
Unfortunately, she said such outcomes are typical in what she described as “blackon-black crimes.” If her son had been white, prosecutors would have pursued Marlow, she said. Instead, they abandoned the case after Dean was convicted.
Roberts vehemently disputed that race is or was a factor in prosecutors’ decision-making.
Still, Tomlinson said she can’t believe Marlow didn’t get as much as a traffic ticket when Dean got a life sentence. Her outrage isn’t personal. She has never met either man.
“I just felt so betrayed,” she said. “They lied to me.”
She makes no excuses for her son. Flint had a lengthy record as did Dean and Marlow, who was convicted of cocaine charges both before and after Flint’s murder.
“All of them had records. My son had one. They were criminals,” she said. “I don’t condone what Eric did. But his death wasn’t right. He should be in prison not in the ground.”
Attorney David Olson, who represented Dean during his first trial, said Assistant State Attorney Aleathea McRoberts offered Dean a plea deal that would have sent him to prison for 10 years.
“His mother was very religious and said God would take care of him and he didn’t need to hear anything else,” Olson remembered. He explained to Dean that if he was convicted at trial he could face a life sentence.
“I don’t think he had sufficient ability to understand the legal culpability he was facing,” Olson said.
He was not alone. In addition to Labarga, the 4th District Court of Appeal and ultimately the Florida Supreme Court struggled with how to handle Dean’s case. When the West Palm Beach-based appeals court in 2013 reversed Dean’s conviction, it took the rare step of suggesting that prosecutors offer Dean a plea deal.
Instead, the case was retried, Dean was convicted and again handed a life sentence.
The case came back for a third time last year when the Florida Supreme Court in a split decision agreed that the 2014 jury should have been told it could convict Dean of manslaughter, which carries a maximum 15-year sentence. However, the court declined to order a third trial.
“So, Dean wins a Pyrrhic victory,” Justice Barbara Pariente wrote in a sharply worded dissent.
However, the high court did agree Dean should be resentenced. That set the stage for next week’s hearing.
McRoberts has already filed court papers announcing that she will again ask that Dean be incarcerated for life. Assistant Public Defender Dan Eisinger hopes she has a change of heart and agrees to recommend a lesser sentence. Dean, he said, is deeply remorseful and thankful for the support he has received from Tomlinson and his family.
“He hopes and prays that one day he will be released from prison so that he can prove to them that their faith in him was justified,” Eisinger said.
For Tomlinson, a compromise would bring some long-sought after relief. “I’ll never get any justice for Eric. I know that,” she said. “Give Christopher Dean a chance. He didn’t take my son’s life. Gregory Marlow did, and he was never punished.”
“I wish Eric would have made better choices,” she said. “Maybe I can save another kid.”