AUGUSTA — Daniel Fortune will spend the rest of his life in prison for his role in a predawn home invasion that left a father and his 10-year-old daughter maimed.
Fortune, 22, of Augusta was sentenced today in Kennebec County Superior Court for the harm he did to the family of former legislator William Guerrette Jr., of Pittston. He will serve two concurrent life sentences.
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In sentencing memos, the prosecution asked Justice Michaela Murphy to sentence Fortune to two concurrent life sentences; the defense recommended Fortune spend an initial 25 years behind bars.
The hearing was the culmination of a chain of events begun in November 2007 when Fortune and another man stole a safe from the Guerrette home containing $111,000 worth of property including $30,000 in cash.
The machete attack came on May 27, 2008, and left both Guerrette and his daughter Nicole with permanent brain injuries. Guerrette has scars on his left arm and lost a finger. Nicole bears scars as well, many of them covered by her long dark hair.
The family spoke at the sentencing.
Fortune pleaded not guilty to all charges related to that attack, and denied harming anyone. He admitted being there at the time with his roommate and foster brother, Leo R. Hylton, now 20. Fortune said Hylton repeatedly slashed the two with the machete.
Hylton pleaded guilty to charges related to the home invasion and was sentenced Feb. 26 to 90 years in prison with all but 50 years suspended and 15 years’ probation.
Fortune was tried over seven days in Skowhegan last month and was convicted of four counts of aggravated attempted murder of the two Guerrettes — two involving extreme cruelty and two involving premeditation — as well a charge of attempted murder involving the three other family members at home at the time, two counts of elevated aggravated assault, robbery, burglary, conspiracy to commit robbery and violation of condition of release.
Prior to the trial, Fortune pleaded guilty to charges of theft, failure to appear and violation of condition of release, all related to the theft of the safe.
Today no one spoke on Fortune’s behalf except for his attorney Pamela Ames. Ames argued that Fortune should be sentenced as an accomplice rather than the principal offender in the home invasion.
Fortune had been a star athlete at Gardiner Area High School and on track for a post graduate year at a preparatory school when his adoptive mother died, and his life began unraveling.
Fortune was born in Haiti and adopted as a baby by a Waterville family; when that adoption failed, he was adopted by the Fortunes when he was 8.
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