This from the Kokomo Tribune: PERU, IN — After less than two hours of deliberation, a jury on Friday found a former Miami Correctional Facility inmate guilty of voluntary manslaughter, a Level 2 felony, for his role in the June 2019 death of another inmate while at the prison.
Voluntary manslaughter — introduced to the jury around closing arguments on Friday — is a lesser included charge of murder, which was the charge that defendant Phillip Sadler, 55, was originally facing.
According to Duhaime’s Law Dictionary, voluntary manslaughter is often used as a lesser included charge of murder if it has what is known as “sudden heat,” which refers to escalation of anger, rage or jealousy that causes an individual to act out without premeditation.
A Level 2 felony charge of voluntary manslaughter carries with it a weight of 10-30 years in prison, according to Indiana statute, with an advisory sentence of 17.5 years.
However, Sadler was not yet set to be released from prison for prior offenses until 2033, and it’s unclear how much of this upcoming sentence for voluntary manslaughter will run concurrently with his previous convictions and when he would now be eligible to be released.
Sadler’s charge stems from an incident that occurred on June 10, 2019, when the body of inmate Lannie Morgan, 70, was found lying face down inside his cell at the MCF.
Morgan was unresponsive and not breathing when prison officials began life-saving measures, and he was later pronounced dead at Dukes Memorial Hospital in Peru.
In a taped police interview that aired in court earlier this week, Sadler confessed to killing Morgan, saying he smothered Morgan with a gray cloth and held him down for several minutes.
He then told police he took the cloth, threw it into a nearby trash can and then washed his hands before returning to his cell.
During Friday’s evidence portion of the trial, Dawn Combs, a forensic biologist that works at the Indiana State Police Laboratory in Indianapolis, testified that ISP analyzed several items for DNA in this case, including the gray cloth that Sadler said he used to kill Morgan, Sadler’s prison uniform and DNA swabs of both Sadler and Morgan.
According to Combs, the lab was able to confirm Morgan’s blood was on the gray cloth, as well as in several locations on Sadler’s uniform.
Along with DNA experts, several court-appointed doctors testified at Friday’s trial as to Sadler’s competency at the time the encounter with Morgan occurred.
The insanity defense was an issue that defense attorney Kristina Lynn argued throughout the week, noting that Sadler had several mental health issues related to his history with trauma that kept him from understanding the “wrongfulness” of his actions that day.
However, all three psychologists and psychiatrists agreed that Sadler — though he had anger issues and anti-social personality disorder — was sane when he encountered Morgan at the prison.
“He said it was as easy as making a cup of coffee or turning on TV,” forensic psychiatrist Dr. George Parker testified, referring to his interview with Sadler about his actions the day he said he killed Morgan.
Sadler’s sentencing is scheduled for 2:30 p.m. May 24 inside Miami Court Superior 1.