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An 18-year-old facing incarceration is allowed to change his no-contest plea to a lesser charge of lewd and lascivious battery on a 13-year-old.
By CARRIE JOHNSON
© St. Petersburg Times, published August 1, 2001
INVERNESS -- Just three months ago, Sean Spiddle's future looked bleak.
The 18-year-old Crystal River resident was facing 14 months in a facility for juvenile sexual offenders for having sexual contact with a 13-year-old girl at a party. Spiddle pleaded no contest to the offense.
"I didn't really think it was that much of a big deal," Spiddle said. "I didn't know there was such a strict punishment for it."
On Tuesday, a judge reduced Spiddle's sentence from a wallop to a slap. Circuit Judge Barbara Gurrola ordered Spiddle to serve 10 months of probation for lewd and lascivious battery with a child over the age of 12 but under the age of 16.
Gurrola withheld adjudication when sentencing Spiddle, which means he technically was not convicted of the crime.
"I think it's great," Spiddle said Tuesday. "I really think the judge made the right decision."
But his father, Kevin, said while he's pleased his son received a second chance, his faith in the criminal justice system has been shattered.
"Most Americans sit at home and figure that what goes on in the courtroom is justice," Kevin Spiddle said Tuesday. "Well, it's really not."
Kevin Spiddle said he believes his son was coerced into accepting a plea agreement for the sexual battery charge in May. Prosecutor Jeffery Smith told Sean Spiddle that if he didn't accept the plea, he would be charged as an adult and risk a sentence of 30 years or more in prison.
Smith has said it is standard procedure to give defendants age 16 or older who are charged with sex-related crimes a choice of pleading guilty to a second-degree felony or going before a jury as an adult.
In an unusual move, Assistant State Attorney Lisa Herndon began looking into the case at the request of attorney Michael Blackstone, whom Kevin Spiddle hired shortly after his son pleaded no contest to the sexual battery charge.
After interviewing the victim and other witnesses, Herndon agreed to allow Spiddle to change his plea from sexual battery to lewd and lascivious battery.
But that doesn't mean Spiddle's actions are excusable, Herndon warned. She agreed to the new hearing because a witness came forward who said the 13-year-old victim was not asleep at the time of the sexual encounter with Spiddle, contrary to what she had told authorities.
"We're not minimizing at all what he did," Herndon said. "We're just taking the force element out of it."
There are rigid rules Spiddle must follow during his probation, including participating in sexual offender counseling and drug and alcohol testing. Spiddle also will not be allowed to have unsupervised contact with a child under the age of 16 during his sentence.
But it's still a huge improvement over what he was facing just a few short months ago. Now Spiddle is looking forward to completing high school and hopes to join the Navy when his sentence is completed.
"I've learned to stay as far away from the system as possible," Spiddle said.