WEST PALM BEACH — Two families made emotional bids in a West Palm Beach courtroom Friday; one in search of justice for Angel Vargas, and the other urging mercy for the man who killed him.
Palm Beach County Circuit Judge Howard Coates landed somewhere in between. He sentenced 33-year-old Albert Clark to 45 years in prison, ending a years-old case that spawned two murder trials earlier this year after the first ended in a mistrial. The sentence is 15 years fewer than prosecutors recommended but several decades more than Clark's defense attorneys did.
Jurors convicted Clark of manslaughter, attempted manslaughter and shooting into an occupied vehicle at the conclusion of his second murder trial in April. Over the span of a week, prosecutors and Clark's team of public defenders offered competing versions of what happened on May 27, 2020.
Both versions began in a crowded Kmart parking lot along Federal Highway, where Vargas and his friend Carlos Hernandez met Clark to inspect the Ford F-150 he listed for sale online. By all accounts, the sale did not go through. The reason remains in dispute.
Related: They thought the 'stand your ground' defense would save them. Only once did a judge agree.
Hernandez said that after the sale went sour, Clark lured them to a secluded parking lot and demanded the money anyway, killing Vargas and paralyzing Hernandez as they tried to drive away. Clark testified that the opposite was true — that after he called off the sale, the men followed him to the empty lot and trapped him there, giving him no choice but to draw his rifle and shoot.
His self-defense argument, given first to police, then years later to Coates, didn't stop prosecutors from charging him with first-degree murder and attempted murder. It did make an impression with jurors. Their manslaughter verdict put an end to Clark's hope for an acquittal but spared him an automatic life sentence in prison, too.
If Coates' sentence stands, Clark will be 78 by the time it ends.
Gunman apologized to victim's family at sentencing hearing
Coates' decision Friday followed an apology from Clark to Vargas' family and his own.
"I'm terribly sorry about what happened," he said. "I'm truly sorry for you losing a loved one, me potentially losing whatever I'm about to lose right now."
Public Defender Carey Haughwout described Clark as a hard worker, one who was taken from his biological mother when he was a child and had no notable criminal record before his arrest in 2020. She called Clark's loved ones to testify about his character and how the death of his brother and stepmother in 2019 negatively impacted him.
She also gave the judge a spreadsheet of 26 other defendants convicted of manslaughter with a firearm in Florida between 2022 and 2023. Cindy Anderson, a former software developer and current assistant public defender, testified that the average sentence was about 12 years, with a maximum of 25 and a minimum of one.
"Is Mr. Clark the worst of the worst?" Haughwout asked, urging Coates to heed the examples contained in the spreadsheet. "I would submit not."
More: Ex-teacher, who avoided jail for loaded gun on campus, arrested after missed therapy sessions
Assistant State Attorney Marci Rex pointed out that the spreadsheet didn't mention Larry Darnell Young , who Coates sentenced to 40 years in prison for manslaughter with a firearm in 2023. Haughwout objected when Rex began to question Anderson about its absence but was quickly overruled.
"I know what I did in Young, and that's not on here," Coates said. "It should be."
Rex called upon Vargas' mother, Maria Moreno, and sister, Beatriz Vargas, to testify, with the help of a Spanish translator. Both spoke of the pain they'd endured since Vargas' death in 2020. Beatriz said she feared Clark would hurt someone else if given the chance. She held up a photo of her brother.
Clark's brother Brent Clark Jr. did the same.
"I'm sorry for what happened to the family, but he was in fear for his life," he said.
Investigators found no evidence that either Vargas or Hernandez was armed. Rex reminded the judge that Clark didn't call 911 in the aftermath of the shooting, but instead fled from the police. When they arrested him, he "lied and lied and lied."
His actions were not those of a frightened man, Rex said.
Hannah Phillips covers public safety and criminal justice at The Palm Beach Post. You can reach her at hphillips@pbpost.com .
This article originally appeared on Palm Beach Post: West Palm gunman who beat murder charge will spend decades in prison for manslaughter instead
Most Popular
Comments / 0