PANAMA CITY — One former prison guard will be defending himself at trial against charges he conspired in an orchestrated beating of an inmate.
Christopher Blake Christmas, 32, was scheduled to plead guilty Wednesday before the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Florida. However, as Judge Robert Hinkle questioned him about changing his not guilty plea, Christmas denied any prior knowledge of a group attack on an inmate but said he was accepting a plea deal in hopes of a lighter sentence.
“I didn’t know they had plans to do anything other than escort the inmate,” Christmas told the court. “At no time did I hear (the captain) say he would yell [that] the inmate spit on him and that we were to jump on him, although I don’t doubt he said it, because he was that type of person.”
Christmas was one of five Florida Department of Corrections (DOC) officers indicted on charges of violating 31-year-old Jeremiah Tatum’s rights to not suffer cruel or unusual punishment at the Northwest Florida Reception Center (NWFRC) in Washington County during an act of jailhouse retaliation.
All but Christmas have pleaded guilty to the charges, with James Fletcher Perkins pleading guilty earlier Wednesday. William Francis Finch, Robert Lewis Miller and Dalton Edward Riley have admitted to accepting orders from former Capt. James Kirkland prior to slamming the inmate face-first to the ground and then falsifying reports of the incident. Kirkland has since died from a self-inflicted gunshot wound.
Defense attorney Rachel Renee Seaton-Virga initially said in court Wednesday that with the four other men prepared to testify, Christmas was accepting a guilty plea to keep his family from suffering a longer hardship.
“He’s the sole provider for his family and if convicted at trial he faces a substantially longer sentence,” she said. “He has elected to forgo a trial in hopes of a lighter sentence.”
However, prosecutor Gayle Littleton said the evidence stacked against Christmas, including video from the prison beating, was the real reason he was accepting a guilty plea.
“The government’s evidence against Christmas is very strong,” she said. “It is clear the captain yells and all of the officers take the inmate down, including Mr. Christmas. Then the captain says, ‘He spit on me.’ ”
However, Christmas decided during the debate he will be going to trial.
The arrests of the officers stemmed from an Aug. 5, 2014, incident, during which Tatum was left severely injured. Prosecutors claim Kirkland sought retaliation from a previous incident, where Tatum deflected pepper spray onto him. Kirkland then organized an incident in which Tatum was again sprayed, and Kirkland called in a five-man extradition team to escort Tatum to a decontamination shower, prosecutors allege. As the men equipped themselves for the extradition, Kirkland allegedly told the officers he would state that Tatum spit on him leading up to the beating “to teach him a lesson,” according to court records.
Video from the prison showed Tatum being slammed face first to the concrete floor by Finch and Riley while Tatum’s hands were restrained behind his back and his ankles restrained. The three other officers then jumped on Tatum and pinned him to the ground, according to arrest records.
Christmas said he didn’t hear the orders to attack Tatum and that he helped restrain his legs because “that’s my job,” he said.
Hinkle encouraged Christmas to ask to take his case before a group of jurors to determine the facts in the case, but he also said precedent allowed him to accept a guilty plea from a person claiming innocence.
“This is the stuff of which jury trials are made,” Hinkle said.
Jury selection begins July 8. The four other officers face up to 10 years in prison and up to a $250,000 fine.