Fill out this form to email this article to a friend
Plea deal gets teen sentence of 35 years
By ALEXANDRA ZAYAS
Published March 18, 2006
At 16, Marquis Devon Alexander and a friend donned masks, packed guns and robbed a Town 'N Country Subway restaurant, leaving one employee dead and another severely injured in December 2004.
At 17, it was time for another life-changing decision: take a 35-year sentence in a plea deal for second-degree murder and a list of other charges. Or face a jury trial and risk life in prison.
On Thursday in Hillsborough Circuit Court, it was decision time.
Alexander accepted the deal and pleaded guilty. He was sentenced to 35 years in state prison and 10 years of probation. And he wasn't the one accused of pulling the trigger that night.
Phillip Austin Jr., 19, is suspected of being the shooter. Austin, an ex-Subway employee, has not yet been charged with this crime, but has been in jail since Dec. 11, 2004, in an unrelated taxicab carjacking case. As a condition of Alexander's plea deal, he has to help detectives investigate Austin.
Darrell Sebron Doby Jr., 20, admitted driving his friends to the Subway and helping them escape the crime scene. He was sentenced to six years in prison in December 2004.
[Last modified March 18, 2006, 02:30:29]
Share your thoughts on this story
|
News
Fifty years ago, they were screwed-up kids sent to the Florida School for Boys to be straightened out. But now they are screwed-up men, scarred by the whippings they endured. Read the story and see a video and portrait gallery.
Print
Email story
Comment
Email editor
