TBO.com - TBO is Tampa Bay Online

Mom Who Rattled DCF Gets 55 Years In Torture Case

ADVERTISEMENT

By SHERRI ACKERMAN | The Tampa Tribune

Published: November 11, 2008

TAMPA - Candice Clark, a small-time thief who snatched her toddler from Florida custody in 2006 and was arrested later in Wisconsin with a dead woman in her back yard and a severely abused boy in her closet, has been sentenced to 55 years in prison.

Clark, 24, pleaded no contest in a Portage, Wis., courtroom Monday to second-degree reckless homicide and guilty to charges including child abuse. She must serve about 47 years before being eligible to apply for early release. The sentence included 45 years of extended supervision.

Clark gained national attention in 2007 after she removed her 2-1/2-year-old daughter, Courtney, from the custody of a state-appointed caregiver. Clark took the girl cross-country with two other children and a band of identity thieves, police say.

A Sarasota Family YMCA caseworker failed to report Courtney's disappearance for four months. A tip led Portage police to the girl five months later.

The case exposed massive cracks in the state's child welfare system and resulted in the creation of a task force that changed the way workers report children missing in state care.

"This was one of our darkest hours," said Florida Department of Children & Families' Secretary George Sheldon, who was second-in-command at the time. "Everything went wrong in this case. Luckily, Courtney survived."

After Clark was arrested, Sheldon asked his workers how many children were missing in Florida's care. There were 6,000, he said.

Today, thanks to better trained workers and new technology that automatically notifies him of missing children, there are 128.

Not only did Florida learn from its mistakes, Sheldon said. "We did something about it."

Clark was charged in the death of 36-year-old Tammie Garlin, who was strangled and found buried in the back yard of a Portage home Clark shared with boyfriend Michael Sisk, roommate Michaela Clerc, and Garlins' two children.

One was an 11-year-old boy who told detectives the gang burned him with hot water, whipped him with an extension cord and forced him to stay naked in a closet. He also testified that the group abused his mother as well.

Doctors had to amputate several of his fingertips and three badly burned toes. The boy's story attracted sympathy from across the country as people offered to adopt him and sent toys and money.

Sisk, 26, was found guilty in August of second-degree reckless homicide and pleaded guilty and no contest to nine other charges. He has not yet been sentenced. Clerc is serving 37 years in prison.

Information from the Associated Press was used in this report. Reporter Sherri Ackerman can be reached at (813) 259-7144.

Share this:

Loading Comments...

Email Print

ADVERTISEMENT