A convicted sex offender will serve a minimum of 20 years in state prison after a three-judge panel’s vote, a rare move to increase his sentence at the request of county prosecutors.
Ricky Flanders, 50, of Warner was initially sentenced in August 2017 to a minimum of 12½ years for raping a boy he knew at gunpoint nearly three decades ago. Merrimack County Superior Court Judge Richard McNamara handed down the sentence, which prosecutors said was too lenient given the severity of Flanders’s crimes.
A jury convicted Flanders of eight counts of aggravated felonious sexual assault for assaulting the boy multiple times between 1988 and 1993. Despite the jury verdict, Flanders has continued to profess his innocence.
Prosecutors had recommended a term of 20 to 60 years, while the defense had argued for a minimum of five years. McNamara ultimately handed down a 15-year minimum sentence but said Flanders was eligible to get 2½ years off the minimum if he successfully completes sex offender programming and is of good behavior while incarcerated.
Earlier this month, three superior court justices reviewed Flanders’s sentence after issues were raised by the Merrimack County Attorney’s Office, which prosecuted the case. Justices Lawrence MacLeod Jr., Charles Temple and Tina Nadeau, who serves as chief justice of the state’s superior court system, presided over an informal hearing March 16, when each side had approximately 15 minutes to argue their position.
While Flanders’s attorneys asked the sentence review board to uphold the sentence, prosecutors argued for a more severe punishment to both deter individuals from committing similar crimes and to assure the public that violent offenders will be locked up for a long time.
Assistant County Attorney Joseph Cherniske said McNamara made three critical errors when issuing his decision, including operating under the false assumption that “the standard minimum sentence for an AFSA (aggravated felonious sexual assault) case is 20 to 40 years.”
Years after the sexual abuse ended, Flanders continued to threaten the victim, according to court testimony. Cherniske told the three-judge panel that law-abiding behavior between the date of a crime and the date of a conviction may result in a reduced sentence for some defendants, yet Flanders continued to impose harm.
When handing down a sentence, a judge must consider both mitigating circumstances – factors that weigh in the defendant’s favor and might result in a lesser sentence – and aggravating circumstances – factors that increase the severity or culpability of a criminal act and support a stiffer penalty.
It is rare for the board to change the original sentence imposed by the sentencing judge. In this case, the decision was unanimous.
“The increase in defendant’s sentence is based upon the fact that there is no proper application of mitigating and aggravating factors based on the maximum sentences available,” the justices wrote in their brief order.
Upon his release from prison, Flanders will be monitored by parole and have a significant suspended prison sentence hanging over him – something the court could impose should he commit any other crimes.
(Alyssa Dandrea can be reached at 369-3319, adandrea@cmonitor.com or on Twitter @_ADandrea.)