Fugitive on the Run for the Last 30 Years Learns His Fate

A former member of the infamous Black Tuna Gang learned his fate this week. Back in January a former associate of the Miami Black Tuna Gang, Mark Steven Phillips, was arrested more than three decades after fleeing his trial in 1979 for charges of violating the Racketeering Influenced and Corrupt Organization statutes. He was also charged with engaging in a criminal enterprise and possession of marijuana with intent to sell. Phillips was convicted in absentia in February 1980 of racketeering, as well as possession and distribution of marijuana. He was facing additional fugitive charges as well.

Phillips was a director for a boating company back in the 1970s and helped members of the Black Tuna Gang buy boats and re-fit them with hidden compartments for marijuana cargo. He was one of 14 people charged for the same crime, along with Robert Platshorn, also known as “Bobby Tuna” who served out three decades for his involvement in the crime ring. Phillips was arrested in January at a senior community apartment complex in West Palm Beach Florida by the Marshals cold Case Fugitive Squad. They tracked Phillips through Chili, and Germany in the early 80’s, but then lost his known whereabouts.

They found him when the now 62 year-old got a driver’s license in his real name in Florida in 2010. According to the Marshals service at the time, he was living in a small rented apartment, he owns no property, and he was living on a meager $667 a month that he was receiving from social security. His current lawyer argued in court this week that Phillips played a very minor role in the criminal enterprise, and had nothing to do with the actual shipping of tons of marijuana that came to the states. He also asked the judge to consider his clients age, bipolar disorder and the minimal dealings he had with the other members of the Black Tuna Gang. Phillips has been battling mental health issues for the last few years. His lawyer also told the judge that his clients involvement with the entire case was more of a social one. He said that he was the fishing buddy of some of the members of the Black Tuna Gang.

His case was argued in front of the same judge who presided over his case in 1979, District Judge James Lawrence King who is now 83 years old and still serving in Florida. The judge recalled some of the testimony from the original trial. Phillips was on board of a bungled boat trip headed for North Carolina, but ran aground off of the Bahamas. The judge recalled from memory, not any written testimony, that the boat veered off course when drunken crew members began cooking steaks and started a galley fire. That North Carolina-bound boat had 40,000 pounds of marijuana in cargo. Phillips was convicted in North Carolina and sentenced to five years. He never served the term because he was indicted in Miami, then fled during that trial. The Judge followed the suggestions of the defense attorney and sentenced him with five years in prison, a far cry from the life sentence he was facing and the recommendations  from the prosecution that were asking for at least 15 years. The Miami judge will allow those two terms to be run concurrently. His lawyers were happy with the verdict saying that if his health holds up, Phillips can still have a life outside of prison after his release.