By Will Greenlee Port St. Lucie Tribune Posted
April 27 2005
Port St. Lucie · A prosecutor on Tuesday said it was likely that a local sexual predator caught in New York after fleeing his 24-hour house arrest over the weekend would return to prison.
Charles Michael Phillips, 48, left the home where he lives with his mother and investigators used credit-card records and tracked him to New York, where he was captured Monday.
"I would think that it's likely that he would go back to prison," Assistant State Attorney Bruce Harrison said.
"On any violation of probation we try our best ... to get as much incarceration as we can under the facts of the case."
Phillips is expected to appear before a judge in New York today for an extradition hearing and investigators expected he would agree to be extradited to Florida, Port St. Lucie police Capt. Scott Bartal said.
"It's obvious to the department that this person is dangerous, and we can say that with certainty because of his past crimes, that being rape with a weapon and bank robbery," Bartal said. "He made it clear once again that he has a total disregard for the law by doing what he did in leaving his confinement."
The state Department of Corrections won't play a role in determining Phillips' sentence, though his probation officer likely will be in court to answer any questions the judge might have, corrections spokeswoman Debbie Buchanan said.
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