Jamaal Smith

A Miami man was recently sentenced to life in prison for killing three Lakeland residents during a robbery inside a Lakeland home in 2016.

Jamaal Smith, 29, became the second person sentenced in the brutal killing and robbery of Angelica Castro, Eneida Branch and David Washington. In 2019, Johnathan Alcegaire, 31, was sentenced to death by Circuit Judge Jalal Harb on the three murder convictions.

Smith was sentenced to a mandatory life sentence by Harb following a decision by jurors not to recommend a death sentence.

Andrew Joseph, a third defendant, will face the same three murder charges in a trial in May.

Assistant State Attorneys Mark Levine and Kristie Ducharme prosecuted the case against Smith. Jurors convicted Smith of the murders before the trial entered the death penalty phase.

“Make no mistake about it,” Levine told jurors during closing arguments. “There are four victims in the case and the defendant is not one of them.”

“His intentions could not have been clearer in what he planned to accomplish,” Levine said.

Levine said that when Smith and Alcegaire left the house, they believed they had “successfully wiped them out.”

But Felix Campos survived a gunshot wound to the face. During the trial, Campos testified that Smith had shot him below his ear.

Alcegaire, Smith and Joseph were all selling drugs out of Miami. Washington had been buying drugs from Andrew to sell in Lakeland.

State Attorney Brian Haas thanks Assistant State Attorneys Levine and Ducharme and the Polk County Sheriff’s Office for their work on the case.

Julio Aponte

A Frostproof man was convicted Wednesday of robbery.

Wearing a mask over his face, Julio Aponte, 33, used a flare gun to rob two people in the La Botana restaurant food store in Lake Wales.

Jurors took 30 minutes to convict Aponte of robbery with a weapon, attempted robbery with a weapon, and providing false identification to a law enforcement officer. Circuit Judge Michael McDaniel is scheduled to sentence Aponte on Feb. 28.

Assistant State Attorney Jessica Fisher prosecuted the case.

During the trial, Fisher told jurors that Aponte walked into the store on Nov. 6, 2018, behind his friend, who continued toward the restaurant area. Aponte stayed at the front counter, then pointed an orange flare gun at a clerk and a customer paying for items he planned to buy.

As Aponte waved the gun and demanded money, the customer handed Aponte a few bills and Aponte and his friend left the store.

Fisher told jurors that surveillance video showed the robbery and that Aponte’s friend was an unwilling bystander. The only, question, she said, was the identity of the masked man.

But Aponte’s friend testified Aponte was the armed man. In addition, when Polk Sheriff’s detectives investigated they found clothing in Aponte’s room and tennis shoes still on his feet that matched the outfit the masked man was wearing in the store.

The robbery occurred a week after Aponte robbed a convenience store on State Road 60 in Lake Wales with a large knife. In that case tried in late 2019, Circuit Judge Larry Helms sentenced Aponte to two separate life sentences for the charges of robbery with a deadly weapon and burglary while armed.

State Attorney Brian Haas thanks Assistant State Attorney Fisher and Polk County Sheriff’s detectives for their work on the case.