After carrying a 9 mm handgun with him all day at Flagler Palm Coast High School last Sept. 4, Sean Junior Goska, 15, who was on probation for a series of felonies but nevertheless attending school, went to McDonald’s with a few friends and pulled the gun on one of them.
Goska had been arrested in March on charges of burglary, fleeing police, larceny, damaging property and grand theft auto. He was sentenced to probation and eventually sent back to school after a period of home detention. I isn’t known how long he’d been carrying to gun at school.
On Sept. 9, the State Attorney’s Office charged Goska as an adult with three felonies–aggravated assault with a firearm, possession of a weapon on school property, and firearm possession by a delinquent. The charges added up to a maximum penalty of 25 years in prison if convicted.
Last week, Circuit Judge Dawn Nichols, after a sentencing hearing split over two days because of its legal complications, sentenced Goska to 18 to 36 months in a maximum-risk juvenile prison under the supervision of the Department of Juvenile Justice, followed by two years’ house arrest (or community control), followed by three years on adult probation.
The sentence, unusually structured as it combined juvenile and adult elements, was the result of a plea. It included an adjudication of delinquency on the probation violation charges he incurred with the gun charges.
“I need you to understand how grave this is,” Nichols told Goska as he stood before her, barely taller than the lectern, at Friday’s sentencing. “This is not juvenile court where you’re just getting slapped on the wrist and you’re being sent to a facility. You get sentenced in this case, and I send you to state prison as an adult. Do you understand?”
“Yes, ma’am, “ he said. If he reoffends during his probationary term, he could face prison.
“I could legally do that today but for your attorney and the state working something out,” the judge said. “These are incredibly serious charges with incredibly serious consequences.”
Nichols sentenced him as a juvenile offender instead of as an adult, thus reducing his exposure to harsher penalties, and ensuring that, once he completes the sentence–assuming he does not reoffend–he will not have been adjudicated guilty of a felony. He will have his full civil rights, including the right to vote. He could also cut the term of his house arrest at the one-year mark if he makes it to that point without incident. He turned 16 on Nov. 5. A no-contact order is in effect regarding the students he was with on Sept. 4, and he is barred from going to the McDonald’s on State Road 100.
In an interview with a Flagler County Sheriff’s deputy, Goska said he’d been at McDonald’s with the three other students on Sept. 4, but he denied pulling a gun or having one on him.
An Instagram video Goska himself posted and that a witness viewed and reported to authorities indicated otherwise. After getting a report of the video, Deputies searched Goska’s bedroom on Sea Beacon Place in Palm Coast and found a 9 mm Canik firearm with 18 rounds in a magazine, all in a backpack belonging to Goska.
Goska admitted to deputies that he’d obtained the gun three months earlier while breaking into cars in Palm Coast’s E-Section. He also admitted to carrying the gun all day at school, but that he was supposedly holding it for a friend. He said he was only playing around when he pulled the gun on the other student at McDonald’s (they were in the bathroom, out of view of surveillance cameras).
“If you bring a gun to school or point it at someone else, you will be arrested. It doesn’t matter if you think you were just playing around; we will not tolerate this behavior and a 15-year-old playing with a gun is a recipe for disaster,” Sheriff Rick Staly was quoted as saying at the time of Goska’s September arrest. “I commend the students who spoke up and reported this to our school resource deputies so they could investigate. This is a great example of why our SRDs build rapport with our students.”
Note: Once Sean Goska completes his sentence, and absent additional incidents, his name may be redacted from this article.
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