VOLUSIA COUNTY, Fla. — A Volusia County man, who was found guilty of teaching two teenagers how to Dumpster-dive for drugs, just hours before one of them overdosed, was sentenced on Friday during an emotional hearing.
Richard Newkirk will spend the next 24 years behind bars because his 14-year-old friend died from a drug overdose. Newkirk was convicted of second-degree murder because he helped the teenager take a lethal dose of a methadone cocktail.
The judge said 14-year-old Bryce Parson's death was the perfect storm of carelessness, from the methadone clinic which dumped the drugs, to parents who did not keep a close enough eye on their kids, to 32-year-old Newkirk, who persuaded the two boys to steal methadone in order to feed his own addiction.
"Without Bryce we seem to be in fragments," said the victim's mother, Margaret Parson, during the sentencing.
Parson died after Newkirk showed he and another teen how to make a methadone cocktail, which Parson took too much of.
Newkirk showed little emotion during the 2 1/2 hour sentencing, although he did look down several times while Parson's parents scolded him for introducing their son to the drug, showing him where to get it and how to take it.
"I tell myself, 'No, Richard, you didn't stick a gun to my son's head and pull the trigger, but you did you gave him the drug,'" said Wayne Parson.
Prosecutors showed a video of Bryce and his friend Austin Wilcher dumpster diving for methadone outside an Ormond Beach clinic. Investigators said Newkirk drove the teens there and a few hours later Bryce died.
"I took him into the bathroom, and put like water on his head and tried to like smack him around a little, but then I realized there was no point," said Wilcher.
Newkirk also took the stand, and for the first time he was allowed to apologize.
"Not a minute of the day goes by that I don't think of Bryce, what has happened and how I caused and contributed to it, if it would be possible I would exchange my life for his," Newkirk said.
The defense tried to argue that Newkirk never meant for anyone to die, but the judge determined Newkirk's actions led to Bryce's death.
Newkirk's family said Newkirk is a drug addict who needs help, and that putting him behind bars for 24 years is not going to help anyone out of the situation where everyone lost.
Newkirk received 24 years for second-degree murder and delivery of a controlled substance. After the hearing, Newkirk shrugged to his family and left with deputies to start his sentence.