LAKELAND A jury voted Tuesday morning to convict James “Jimbo” Pennington of first-degree murder in the 2017 killing of a neighbor in the Indian Lake Estates community.
The jury deliberated about 4½ hours over two days in the first murder trial held in 10th Judicial Circuit Court since trials were curtailed by a state order amid the COVID-19 pandemic. After the jury announced the verdict, Circuit Judge Jalal Harb sentenced Pennington to mandatory life in prison for the killing of Devyn Martin in October 2017.
Harb also dispensed a concurrent five-year sentence for tampering with physical evidence.
Pennington, now 67, fatally shot Martin after the pair got into an argument on Pennington’s property, the Polk County Sheriff’s Office reported at the time. An investigation found that Martin arrived at Pennington’s home on a golf cart the afternoon of Oct. 26, 2017, and began talking to Christopher Walters, who was repairing a bike in the yard.