Jacksonville trafficking victim advocate gets prison for bullet-laden robbery/kidnapping bid

A Jacksonville woman who won national attention for her advocacy after surviving years of teenage sex trafficking is headed to prison over a failed robbery-kidnapping that left a house and cars riddled with bullets.

Alyssa Beck, now 28, pleaded guilty last year to two felonies in a deal with prosecutors that included a sentence of between five and 30 years behind bars. A co-defendant was sentenced in June to life in prison.

On Friday, Circuit Judge Kevin Blazs set Beck’s sentence at seven years followed by two years of probation, including a residential treatment program with features for trafficking survivors.

“Please do not violate the terms of your probation,” the judge told Beck, warning her that doing so could lead to more years in prison.

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The sentence was less than half of the 15-year term prosecutors asked the judge to order and well under state sentencing guidelines of about 12 years for armed robbery and attempted kidnapping, the charges Beck admitted in her plea deal.

Blazs said he struggled to find a sentence that correctly balanced the crime and its consequences with the redeeming qualities of the defendant, whose lawyer supplied character references including a letter from a Sheriff's Office employee that called Beck “someone who has made mistakes” and that said "I do not believe this defendant is a criminal."

“This is a serious crime. This is not something that is acceptable under any circumstance. It can’t be trivialized,” the judge said.

But Blazs said he weighed that against roughly a decade of crime-free choices Beck had made as she rebuilt her life and advocated for trafficking victims.

“The work that the defendant … has done is something that I don’t see often,” the judge said.

Before the sentencing, allies of Beck had peppered the judge with messages stressing the potential good she could do if she wasn’t locked up.

“Alyssa is not someone who needs to be locked up, but someone who needs services that include a therapeutic environment where trauma and exploitation will be addressed,” wrote Inderjit “Vicky” Basra, president and CEO of the Delores Barr Weaver Policy Center, a nonprofit focused on keeping girls and young women out of the criminal justice system.

Beck worked for the center before being charged with the robbery in 2021. Basra wrote the judge that “Alyssa, if given the chance, is capable of not only changing her future but also the future of other women and girls.”

Beck, who as a teen was trafficked for sex by multiple men, made headlines locally after being jailed on 2011 charges of kidnapping and carjacking that involved a man who used to pimp her out. Facing charges that could have meant life in prison, she was sentenced to probation and the 1,046 days she had already been locked up while her case was decided.

While working for the policy center, she spoke to audiences including members of the International Association of Chiefs of Police and the National Summit on Crime Reduction and Public Safety and was featured in 2018 on the CBS Television program “48 Hours.”

But Beck’s life was nearly derailed by events in 2020 that grew out of her effort to buy prescription drugs on the street and led to a kidnapping and gunfire.

Police reports in court records say that Beck was seeking a supply of Percocet, a brand-name opioid, although prosecution and defense attorneys gave the judge differing accounts of who the pills were for.

The reports say Beck lost $360 in the attempted buy on Justina Road in Arlington and went looking for a man who took the money and vanished.

Hours after the money was lost, that man was visiting a home when Beck appeared at the door with a childhood friend who had since served prison time for selling drugs and was helping recover her money.

Beck’s friend, Arkivia Sanders, had a handgun and told the other man — whose name is redacted on most court records under the state victim protection rule known as Marsy’s Law — that he had to pay up. When the unnamed man said he didn’t have any money, he was made to strip at gunpoint and was taken with several people in two vehicles to his family’s home near Sandalwood High School to get funds.

The undressed man ran into the home as soon as the door opened, and Sanders began shooting into the building, court records said. A man inside the house began firing back, and the exchange left bullet holes in the house and cars parked nearby by the time the people outside left, court records said.

No one was injured by the gunfire.

Because people were in the building, Sanders was convicted of six counts of attempted murder in addition to shooting into a building, robbery and other charges. He was sentenced to life for the robbery with a gun and 30 years for each attempted murder count.

A co-defendant, Joshua Gosnell, was sentenced to nine years for his part in the holdup and for a separate, serious drug charge. Assistant State Attorney Brittany Johnson told the judge Beck was more culpable than Gosnell.

"Alyssa isn’t a minor participant. This incident wouldn't have happened without Alyssa," Johnson said, although defense attorney Shannon Schott said Beck had had driven Sanders to the house and left before there was any gunfire to deal with a car tire going flat.

Schott argued Beck wasn't to blame for her ally deciding to start shooting. "She didn't tell him to do anything," Schott said.

This article originally appeared on Florida Times-Union: Jacksonville trafficking advocate gets 7-year prison term for robbery